Blackout
by Enyo-chan
Summary: During an ordinary evening, occurs a seemingly normal blackout at ShinRa. When the group of friends turn to investigate why the lights never comes back on, it is proven to be something much more serious and over all, dangerous. More info inside.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: So this is a story in which every second chapter is written by me and the rest is written by a friend of mine. Expect that the chapters can greatly vary in lenght. Also, we will be very, very mean to the characters..

Summary: In an abnormal blackout the group travles slowly down the ShinRa building to find an escape from the hell that has burst out from the unknown depths. Fighting, hiding and fleeing are frequent things that they are forced to chose from when they encounter the many creatures that now roam the floors. Pain, suffering and encounters with death comes around and lingers by their sides as well as madness does when victims and memories of the past comes to follow them by their heels. Which comes to take them first, death itself of madness? Or will they survive to escape the building?

Genre: Horror, Supernatural, Friendship, Mystery

Warnings: Character deaths, blood, torture, gore, made up back stories

Main characters: Sephiroth, Genesis, Angeal, Zack, Cloud

Included characters: Anyone you can find in ShinRa, a couple of OCs

Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VII do not belong to any of us

* * *

><p>They were all sitting at the dinner table and waited patiently. It was Sephiroth's new hobby, the art of food making that was about to pay off. Normally if they ate together, Angeal made the food. He was very good at it and always took great happiness in preparing food for his friends.<p>

This time however had he stepped back to give place on stage for his two friends who had never before went too well together with a kitchen.

Sephiroth and Genesis had though found inspiration thanks to Sephiroth's greatest love in this world (next to his over all and everything beloved Masamune), television. They had found a cooking show together and in the darkening evenings of the autumn where there less and less to do, they were stuck.

This time it was Sephiroth who had organized the dinner. It was winter by now and he was humming on something that could very easily be mistaken for a Christmas song. Cloud and Zack exchanged a look and decided silently that it was far too dangerous to mention it. They might be dressed casually; sitting relaxed by the table, but you didn't tease a 1st class SOLDIER about such a thing.

Angeal was happy over that; he didn't want anything to be ruined.

Also he was happy over that they were in Genesis´ apartment. The first times they had had their little "dinner party" they had been by him. His kitchen still had a faint touch of smoke.

Sephiroth and Genesis appeared from the kitchen with pots and pans in their hands.

"And dinner is served." Sephiroth said proudly and smiled. They soon got food on their plates and Genesis had nodded for the others to begin. Zack raised his fork and at the same moment as he took a bite of the delicious looking meat everything went black.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Second chap of this fic, the two of us writing this will try make this a weekly update and I promise that the chaps will most likely become longer as the story continues. This is just the start, when we get more into it, the chapters will be longer!

* * *

><p>"A blackout?" Cloud suggested.<p>

"It's not often there are blackouts in ShinRa." Genesis commented.

"No worry, the reserve generator will probably set to work soon." Angeal said simply as the sound of rain started hitting the windows in the apartment.

They waited in silence for the light to come back on, but it didn't happen.

After about ten minutes with only the sound of the rain and sight of darkness Zack spoke up "Maybe there is something wrong with it?" he said with a little sad tone over the fact he couldn't enjoy the meal he was just served. To say the least, the rest in the room was disappointed too; no one likes to eat in darkness.

"Maybe we should check it out." Sephiroth suggested, he too, a bit saddened by the inappropriate blackout.

The others in the room nodded in agreement before they realized they could barely see each other, except Cloud who didn't have any heightened senses, he could not see anything at all in the darkness.

"Then I think we should go and check it right away before the food gets too cold!" Zack said hopefully and rose from his seat.

The others started towards the door and Genesis made sure to grab one of his Fire materia he always kept close for different reasons.

However they all stopped in their tracks when a loud bump was heard in the room. "Ouch..." said the familiar voice of Cloud and Zack went over to him and lead him in the darkness as they headed out the door to find the problem for why the light didn't turn back on.


	3. Chapter 3

The corridor was pitch-black. Even the SOLDIERs had a bit of a hard time trying to make out things in front of their eyes.

"I told you that we should have bought candles" Genesis said sourly.

"Yes, then we could have been enjoying our meal by now!" Zack said just as sourly.

"For once I do agree" Angeal said with a small grunt. "Why are we not having any candles?"

"I didn't think you would really appreciate the ones they had in store. The only ones that were left were with either pink glitter or with neon pink and purple bands" was Sephiroth's very calm but slightly sour answer.

They all five shivered at the thought.

"And the lot of you shouldn't be complaining" Cloud muttered as they all at once made their way out in the main corridor. "You can see what's before your feet- ouch!" He cried out as he nearly fell over on a stray bucket.

Zack patted his shoulder with sympathy and they continued to walk.

"I smell something funny" Angeal stated later.

"Probably just the leftovers from today's lunch" Zack stated. "That was a handful."

He, who usually ate anything that you put under his nose didn't really want to recall the memories of the lunch. None of them did.

"That was really a handful, Zack" Genesis agreed and made a face of distaste.

They all drew a deep breath and turned away their faces in distaste at the thought.

"Well either that or something has gone and died in the ventilation shaft here" Sephiroth stated with a grimace.

"Seph," Cloud said. "Even I can smell that shit."

"Then it's bad." Zack stated and they moved on in silence after that.

None of them really wanted to think of what that would happen if they met someone. They would never hear the end of the story of a bunch of fearless SOLDIERs tiptoeing around the corridors of the complex in late at night just because the power was gone for half an hour.

They came to a T-crossing of the corridors. They all stopped for some reason. The original plan was to make a halt to decide which way that was shorter.

Sephiroth took another two steps. "Is it bad that I can hear something?" Sephiroth asked in a low voice. His eyes where wide open as if they could help him better understand the sound he heard.

"What do you mean?" Angeal asked without paying any particular attention. He was trying hard to remember the map over the place.

"Is there someone around?" Cloud asked, a little upwards at the thought of other people around.

"It is voices" Sephiroth said in a low voice and took another insecure step forward. "Whispers for help" He continued in a voice so low that it could just barley be heard.

He shook his head slightly as if trying to get rid of something but unaware of what and reached out and touched the wall. He was very relieved when it stood still where it was.

"It's probably just echoes though" he said. "These corridors are long and I hardly think that we are the only ones to be wondering what's going on"

They stood and argued for a few minutes trying to decide if they were going to take the stairs or the elevator. The elevators where faster but they might not be working. They argued another few minutes before deciding to walk to the right to get to the lifts.

When they got there where they happily surprised to see that the elevators where brightly lit up.

They picked the right one of the three and got in. Genesis picked the entrance floor button and they were of.

However, something happened.

When they had only went for a few seconds the elevator stopped between two floors and everything got dark.

"This wasn't a really bright idea was it?" Cloud asked tiredly.


	4. Chapter 4

"Aw, come on!" Zack whined as Angeal pressed the open doors button, hoping it would work, but the doors stayed in place.

"We better get out of this thing" Genesis said annoyingly.

"Well, we will have to pry open the doors" Angeal said and the four SOLDIERs crowded around the doors while Cloud stood at the side, he didn't have the strength they had and would probably just be in the way.

Since they were stuck between two floors, the doors were much harder to open manually than normal but they managed to open it up slowly.

"Hey, do you hear that?" Cloud suddenly asked and the four SOLDIERs stopped with what they were doing and listened to the sound of echoing clicking you get when you tap the blade of a sword on a metal surface. Though, here it was slightly scratching the metal too.

The echoing was coming from above them in the elevator shaft and whatever it was, it was getting closer.

Could it be the cause of the elevator stopping?

The scratching reached them and continued past them, scratching on the outside of the elevator and continuing down the shaft.

"What the hell was that?" Zack asked with a slight hint of fear in his voice.

No one answered his question but instead started prying on the doors again until it was open enough to fit a person through. But then there were the door on the actual floors too, the floor at the roof of the elevator or at the bottom. Since they were heading down, it felt natural to pry open the floor door at their feet.

"I can go first" Genesis offered once the second door was open and crawled through the doors to the next floor and looked around for a moment, hoping there maybe would be some kind of light source on this floor, and waited for the others to crawl out too. Next one out was Sephiroth, then Zack, Cloud and last Angeal.

"I still hear them" Sephiroth whispered, but only Genesis and Angeal listened to him, though neither said anything, they just exchanged looks.

It was obvious that the whispers for help was getting to him, no surprised since he has been trained from young age to help and save his allies. Genesis and Angeal would have felt uneasy too if they just could hear the whispers Sephiroth heard.

"Which way is towards the stairs?" Cloud asked uneasily, he could barely see anything at all, but he could see the silver hair of the great general, the silvery white hair was a great contrast in the dark.

"I believe it's this way." Genesis pointed out and started heading down the corridor, the rest following when they could at least make out which way he went.

"Maybe we should keep talking so that we can keep track of each other." Zack suggested

"That must have been the most intelligent thing I ever heard you say, Zack." Genesis said mockingly making Zack pout, and Angeal and Cloud laugh softly as they went down the corridor.


	5. Chapter 5

Even Sephiroth smiled a little.

They finally reached a door in the corridor and entered. It stank horribly.

"Urgh!" Cloud made a face at the stench. The other ones looked slightly nauseated. A muscle right below Genesis' left eye twitched slightly. Zack drew a deep breath through his mouth and looked disgusted.

"What the hell have happened here?" Angeal asked, without really hoping for an answer.

"Maybe someone has puked in the vent?" Genesis suggested.

"Or someone have simply done us all a great favor and poured out the leftovers that the kitchen promised for tomorrow" Sephiroth suggested hopefully.

"Then why all over the place?" Zack complained and waved his hand in front of his face, it didn't help at all.

The stench was horrible, but they continued.

After a few meters Cloud slipped and dragged Zack down with him. "The floor is wet" he stated simply as he got to his feet again. "And it isn't funny" Zack added sourly, his hair a bigger mess than usual, as the other three laughed at them.

"It is funny" Sephiroth said and chuckled slightly. "You should have seen your face when the floor just seemed to disappear beneath your feet."

He reached out a hand to Zack who was still sitting on the floor.

"That if nothing else is a proof of that it was funny Zack." Cloud stated certainly.

"Yes" Angeal added. "If Seph think it is funny, well then it really is."

Their hearts were much lighter as they went on.

They walked further and further along the corridors. Talking about many things, about food, themselves, even the weather and above all they talked about things that soldiers and hired guns in all times had talked about; about rough conditions out in the field, about stupid regulations, about rules and how to avoid breaking them. In some cases Angeal added, how to not get caught breaking them, Genesis gave Zack a very meaning glare at this point.

They talked about everything.

All participated in the chit chatting but at moments there where argumentations between fewer.

"Seph," Cloud whispered. "What do you hear?"

"Voices" he whispered back in a murmur voice.

"I hear someone crying" Cloud answered in a very small voice and looked over his shoulder.

Angeal and Genesis had not missed the exchanged words. They all looked around a bit and looked slightly unease at the thought of that there now where two persons out of five that heard things when no one else did. And that Cloud heard something could not be explained with that he had the better hearing of a SOLDIER.

It made them nervous.

They all suddenly went quiet. There was a chill in the air.

They felt as if a wind brought ice to the place even if they all knew that they were indoors. They all froze in their steps.

"Please tell me that it is someone more than me that feel like they are having eyes on them." Zack said with something nervous in his voice.

"Zack, just don't talk about it" Genesis answered, a little unease at the thought.

The feeling didn't pass. They continued to walk.

Nothing worse happened.

"Probably just the heating having a little down right now" Angeal said in an attempt to make them feel better. It did help a little.

That was until they all felt that something was beginning to happen around them. There was no wind and still they felt as if something was twirling around in the corridor, pushing them all forwards and twirling itself around them.

They reached the end of the corridor and went through the doors and out in the room that followed the corridor. The big room was empty. It shouldn't be. They stopped.

Something froze the fearless SOLDIERs to their spot. Then they all heard a loud sound, coming from far away.

It was impossible to tell what is was but it sounded like something horrible. Then there was that wind like thing that twirled itself around them even though they all knew that there was no wind.

Sephiroth walked forwards until he was standing in the middle of the room. Then they heard a different sound so far in the distance that they could not tell what it was. It was very distant and not a good sound. Something happened, something they all knew that.

"Something is coming from down deep. I know it." Sephiroth's voice was deep and filled with darkness. He had turned his head to the ground as if trying to see down through the many layers of steel and concrete."Don't ask what" he said and looked his friends in the eyes. "But it's something." He rubbed his wrists with his hands slowly, one after the other.

There were still marks in the pale skin; marks of torture; marks of the shackles that had bond him for as long as he could remember. He usually concealed them with anything possible but he hadn't today. The bracelets he usually wore had gone off while cooking.

The trail of thoughts triggered by the combined sensations of fear, and the feeling he had about the big something else, brought him back in time, back to the time when the scars that now where marks where open wounds

"Master is angry tonight" he said in a low voice, mostly to himself and shivered.

He looked up again and neither Angeal nor Genesis had ever seen such fright in his eyes.

He shook his head a little and looked them in the eyes one by one once again. He was back from the living nightmare that had been his only presences for so many years. He was here now, with his friends. Hojo would never, ever bring him back there again. He would never again be chained and tortured in a process without end.

He went back to the others.

They met up with him and together they got into the next corridor.

As Sephiroth´s foot hit a small piece of metal on the floor something struck him. The sounds were first of claws against metal and the second of metal ripped in pieces Sephiroth realized and stopped.

"Why am I not having Masamune when I need her," he muttered.


	6. Chapter 6

The sound of metal ripping in pieces echoed in what could only be the vent system above them and the clawing was echoing in rapid succession through the corridor walls as something was dashing down the long hall towards them.

On instinct and with the sense of danger the all turned towards the echoing clawing against tiled floors and reached for their weapons they did not have.

With a painful screeching sound something leapt into the air towards the closest person, which happened to be the young cadet.

A fire ball flew through the air and hit something in the air made of flesh that fell to the floor. Cloud had noticed the ball of fire and ducked away even if it would have missed him anyways.

The screeching sound was heard once again and on the floor behind Cloud laid a struggling figure aflame much alike a human, yet so much different.

The smell of burning human flesh, yes human flesh it did smell like, the SOLDIERs knew that smell all too well, plus the sight made all of them nauseated. The form stopped struggling and the flame went out.

Everyone stood in silence waiting for someone to say anything.

"I guess it was a good idea after all to bring this." Genesis said silently with wide eyes of chock and holds his materia close to him.

"What in Ifrit's burning hell was that!" Zack suddenly burst out with horror earning a slam in the back of his head by Angeal and a row of 'shh' from everyone.

If dangerous things lurked around here they better keep quiet.

Cloud stepped away from the thing as Sephiroth was the first one to approach the rests of the thing and bending down, trying his best to ignore the horrible stench.

"There can't have been much flesh on this considering how fast it burnt down to bones." He commented and the rest dared taking a few steps closer.

Only some ashes were still glowing making it possible for even Cloud to make out the skeleton of the creature that just tried to attack him. They could tell that the being was about the same height as an average human, but the bone structure of the legs and spine told that it would walk bent forward and its knees very much bent, this would make it only about slightly over one meter in height. All its bones were thin indicating that it was probably a very light weight being. Its feet was human like but had short, but broad claws instead of toes, its hands much too alike the ones of a human, the four fingers of the hand were incredibly long (almost 50 to 60cm), sharp and blade like but the thumb only had a small claw, probably made for gripping and holding on to things.

However, it was the head that was the most bothersome. As the body was much alike a deformed humans the head had no resemblance whatsoever. It was small and oval, broad mouth full of razor sharp teeth like a miniature mouth of a behemoth and big holes for the eyes with some burning ashes still in the skull, making it look like the skeleton was glaring at them.

The cold nonexistent wind twirled around them and seemed to give life for the burning ashes as they started flickering with more power before they extinguished and left the friends in darkness once again.

"Where has that thing come from?" Cloud whispered as they all started walking away from the corpse.

They all knew the oh so possible answer, but no one dared utter the possible theory.

They continued in silence and strained their hearing abilities until they finally reached the stair chases. They all tried to ignore the horrible stench and the uneasy feeling of cold nonexistent wind there.

"It will take some time to reach the main floor." Angeal noted "We are still on the apartment floors."

"Which of them?" Genesis questioned, not bothering to look for himself what was written on the wall by the stairs

"Floor 50" Sephiroth answered for Angeal "Next comes the office floors." He finished and they started down the stairs, first Angeal, then Sephiroth and Zack, lastly Genesis and Cloud.

"Watch your steps; something slippery is covering the steps." Angeal warned as he felt his own foot slip slightly on the stair steps. Still, Cloud slipped and slid down the stairs bringing Zack in front with him down to the bottom of this flight of stairs.

The trio still standing sighed and hurried down as they heard a big bump and two voices complaining to each other.

"How did it go?" Angeal asked the two youngsters

"I'm fine, I don't know about chocobo here though." He answered nervously and got a grunt of pain from the smaller one underneath him and got off.

"I landed on something." Cloud complained as Zack helped him up.

Sephiroth and Genesis came down from the stairs and Genesis let out a gasp; surprised at what he saw. Zack too let out a gasp when he looked at the floor where Cloud just been. Cloud would probably gasped too if he could just see in the dark "What is it?" he said with an innocent voice.

"Another cadet" Sephiroth answered calmly "Dead." and Cloud gasped too now this time.

He had landed on the helm of a fellow cadet that seemed to have been on the way up.

"I think I know what the slippery on the floor is now." Angeal said uneasily

"Please can we hurry on?" Zack said with a somewhat desperate voice.

"I agree with the puppy for once." Genesis stated and started walking down the next flight of stairs.

The others didn't complain and followed him quietly, Sephiroth and Angeal, then Zack and Cloud.

On occasion Sephiroth would make an almost invincible twitch as the whispers for help continued, they kept on at the same volume as before. Then there were some kind of familiarity he felt with the whispers and he held up his hands and looked at the long lasted marks on his wrists. When he was imprisoned there was always whispers for help from other imprisoned, he too would on rare occasions whisper silently for help like the voices echoing.

Cloud was shivering; he didn't like the crying in the distance. The atmosphere combined with the crying reminded him of his time when he first arrived to ShinRa, before he met Zack. He wasn't accepted by the rest, he was bullied, picked on. When he got the opportunity he would cry when he was alone, but not anymore.

Genesis began whispering suddenly, not loud enough for anyone to hear, but enough for Angeal, Sephiroth and Zack to make out his mumbling voice. No one said anything though; they just thought he was reciting LOVELESS again to find some kind of comfort.

His whispers got loud enough at last for even Cloud to hear, and as suggested, he recited LOVELESS.

However, his voice was becoming shakier.

Angeal started to worry about his childhood friend, it wasn't often Genesis would recite his beloved poem with such doubt in his voice as now.

As they reached the next end of stairs he hurried up to his childhood friend and put a hand on his shoulder

"How do you feel?" Angeal asked with some concern as Genesis stopped in his tracks and looked down.

"I can hear them too." He whispered without looking up as the rest stopped next to him and Angeal.

"What do they say to you?" Zack asked in horror, he and Angeal were the only ones left now.

"Horrid things about the Goddess, me and everything that I believe in, just like that time…" Genesis' words faded away, but Angeal could guess what he was hinting towards.

Once on a mission Genesis was captured and later saved by Sephiroth and Angeal who were the only ones that got to know about the things that happened to him there. Both psychical and physical torture that had him out of service for some time.

What was happening to them, hearing different whispering voices and weird things happening to the building?

This was all too obvious not a normal blackout.


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: I've done a update of all the past chapters, not on the content but the layout. Hopefully the story looks a bit better like this! Also I'd like to thank those who has shown interest in this story so far, it means much! ^^

Sephiroth took a step forward, a bit unsure of what to do.

He knew what had happened and understood what Genesis heard.

He finally decided that it was better not to say anything complicated. He never managed to say things the way he wanted to anyway. He just laid his hand on the other ones shoulder and they went on.

"There are no words, and still I try to find them" Sephiroth finally whispered to Genesis.

They continued to walk down the stairs warning each other for slippery spots but they didn't really speak with each other. That was, until they reached a place where the stairs were blocked by wreckage.

"But what in the most bloody hell is the point of this!" Genesis swore in a low voice.

"I fear that we will simply have to go to one of the other staircases, don't worry there are plenty of them." Angeal said and tried to make the others see things from the bright side.

"And you have made me run up and down every single one of them" Zack muttered and made a face mimicking an innocent puppy.

They all smiled at the face of the "innocent little puppy" that had not at all deserved the extra exercise.

They decided to walk down the corridor right in front of the doors to the staircase. It was probably good for their health though that they didn't see the five pairs of yellow eyes in different sizes that appeared behind them, watching them from the other side of the blockade and then slinking away in the dark again.

There was very little light around them.

They walked down the dark corridor in silence.

Suddenly there was a sound, something in the distance. Like a music box playing a small melody or light voices singing.

Angeal stopped. "I hope you heard that to."

The other ones nodded.

"I don't know if I really should be relieved of that" Cloud said in a small voice.

A loud giggle made them stop. "Master is angry tonight, master isn't happy tonight!" They heard an approaching voice. It was very light. The voice echoed through the vent shafts towards them. The light voice giggled again. "Master is mad tonight. Really, really mad!"

The corridor was no longer completely dark. There was a soft light coming from somewhere around. They couldn't see from where.

"Something have indeed went south around here" Angeal muttered.

Suddenly the vent closest to them opened and something shining appeared; a head. It was the head of a little girl, very small, not more than two or three years old. Her face was turned towards them and they could see that her eyes shone with a bright light yellow light. Her hair was short and hanged towards the floor. She giggled a soft little giggle and smiled.

"Master is mad tonight. He isn't happy at all" she said in a light happy voice and giggled again. She had almost no teeth but didn't seem to miss them.

"The voices of ten thousand murdered children will echo here tonight" Cloud read from the wall in the light of the little thing.

It brought chills to them all.

The little girl laughed and jumped down. She took Zack by the hand and led them a bit forwards. Then she pointed at a door and said "Grrr." Then she laughed and ran around them in a circle stopping at each and every one of them to hug them, to climb up in Sephiroth´s hair and to swing herself around in Genesis´ coat. She then went still and walked up to Sephiroth, took his hand and smiled. His big hand was gripping hers so small one.

She looked him in the eyes steadily. Then she pointed at the door and said "Bad things that way" in a very low voice. "Bad people hurt" she then said and took his wrist in both of her hands. She laid her hand at the scars.

"Bad people hurt us" she said. Then she smiled at him again and hugged him.

She then ran around them, hugging their knees. After a couple of leaps she brought out a music box from the front pocket of the dress. She started playing on it and danced back and forth but always further and further away.

"It is warm," Zack said in a low voice. "It is a warm-blooded, something."

"Yes, but it's not all innocent because of that" Angeal added as they followed it with their eyes as it was running around in the room spreading it's bright yellow light around itself in cascades as if it was running in water.

Then before their eyes she ran straight into the wall and disappeared just as suddenly as she came.

Darkness surrounded them again.

"It is one of thousands of children that Hojo have murdered I believe." Sephiroth's voice was surprisingly light for the subject. He never talked about Hojo, ever.

The little that Angeal and Genesis had managed to get out of him was only things giving them shivers at the thought of, but apparently was the information that they had pried out of Sephiroth merely a scratch on the surface.

"Perhaps she is still warm, but the dead sure have her. She has been badly treated; chained and tortured. I thought there had been an end to these things" Sephiroth's voice was nothing but a whisper.

"What's happening here really?" he said and shook his head.


	8. Chapter 8

A/N: Sorry for the wait on this chap, I've been bussy with other stuff.. -.-; And sorry again if the length is a dissapointment for the amount of wait.

Then they all turned towards the door the ghost girl had pointed to. Something unnatural was happening with the building and a power greater than human understanding was now trying to point out their paths. What were they to expect to find on the other side of that door if they choose that path, monsters like the one from before, more innocent victims or maybe the path that will lead them forward?

Still as Angeal noted, even if the child seemed innocent there still was a presence that was anything but. The spirits of the dead maybe wished them to stop the endless torture so they could rest in peace, or they could be driven by revenge for their lost lives and wish to get rid of everyone and everything that has a connection to their death cause.

Sephiroth didn't believe the girl would lead them to their deaths. He started towards the door with confident steps.

"You are going in there?" Genesis said with disbelief, slightly shaking with nervousness and uneasiness from many different things.

Sephiroth nodded, and then realized they could barely see him and answered with confident "yes" and put his hand on the door handle. Slowly he opened the door, just in case there really would be a monster in there.

But the moment he stuck his head through the door he wished there would have been a monster instead.

If they thought the stench in the corridors was bad, then this was five times worse, it was so bad even Sephiroth had to back away from the door in a hurry, making the others wonder what was in the room and take a few steps closer themselves. Then they wished they hadn't when the horrible stench of death sipped into the corridor.

"Ugh! What a smell! What the hell is it?" Zack burst out and then tried to cover his nose and mouth with the neck of his shirt.

"I'd rather not know if you ask me." Cloud said obviously nauseated.

They just stood there and got used to the horrible smell, if that was possible, mostly because Sephiroth was the one reluctant to leave the room unchecked.

When he went to go inside the room the others followed slowly, if there were some kind of danger lurking in the room they would not just leave their friend alone with it. It was obviously an office, for which worker they were going to find out. The floor was a sea of blood that stuck to their boots, books in shelves had been thrown out from their places and torn into millions of shreds, documents laid sprawled everywhere, covered in blood and stuck to walls and even the roof of the room. The desk on the other side of the room had plenty of scratches but they could not tell if the dark wood of the desk was too covered in blood or not, no one felt like touching it and find out anyway. Behind the desk sat the remains of a person with what would supposedly be a white coat. They would have said it was one of the scientists if it wasn't because the scientists had their offices down with the laboratories. The flesh of the man seemed to have been ripped away from his bones; the big chunks of flesh lying around the body on the floor just confirmed that.

"He must have been one of the head medics on the hospital section below us." Sephiroth noted after having a look at the corpse. The size of the office made it obvious that this was an important person.

"Why would a doctor be considered a bad person?" Cloud questioned innocently "Haven't they saved many lives?"

There was a short silence following his question.

"Actually, I've never trusted the hospital section." Angeal said "Being there have always given me the same feeling as the labs." The comment made them all shiver.

"I've never liked the hospital section either." Genesis admitted as well "They call me there for check-ups I don't even know the purpose of, and they always try to find reasons for me to stay even if I'm fully recovered from something." He shivered as he thought of the possibility with the hospital working with the labs with something secret.

Everything went silent again as Sephiroth scanned through the desk to see if there were anything at all that had been spared from the hell that had occurred in this room. He then found a protection folder, with supposedly documents in it, that was undamaged and picked it up "Let's leave." He stated.

"Finally!" Genesis said relieved and they went out.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: Sorry for the long waiting time for this chapter, things haven't really gone as planned. But now there will hopefully be back to uploading acording to my scheme.

They were all at different levels of unease as they closed the doors to the office of the previously important man as silently as they possibly could. They didn't want to draw attention to themselves if it was not very necessary.

They were all entirely sure that there was not really anything to worry about inside their own well known building, or well, so they tried to convince themselves. They were all warriors and they did after all belong to the best trained force that their world knew of. (At least according to their boss) Such, warriors as them, as all cadets and in front of everything else surly each and every SOLDIER that the ShinRa company held within or outside its walls were to be above such silliness as simple fear of the dark.

They all knew it, but still acted on the instincts of hiding and carefulness that their training had tainted their blood with, to the point where they gripped for their swords when something disturbed them in their sleep even if they were safe at home and unarmed.

Right now were nothing as it normally was however, there was no army to shield behind in times of fear, there was not even a small shelter or a shield! There were the five of them, four who could see in the darkness surrounding them and none who wielded their weapons.

The insecurity was very present in all of their minds and needless to say where they not in any particularly good mood.

Sephiroth where trying to not fall into the darkness of his own thoughts. He didn't know what would happen but he wasn't exactly eager to get to know that either.

Genesis tried to ignore the voices as he had come to the conclusion that doing so would force them to not exist anymore. He had talked himself into that that was the most sane thing to do of all things possible in this growing madness.

Cloud on the other hand didn't ignore the quiet crying in the background, he continued and tried to push away the thoughts that followed in the track of the crying like a starving murderous pack of wolves who have found the scent of a deer. And a rather wounded deer that was.

Angeal was concerned with what that would happen next to them, he wasn't sure of anything now, not of what to do or where to go. He wished he had his sword, he wished he knew what was going on and he wished that it would all just stop. He himself where harbouring no thoughts of revenge concerning he himself, but he was getting less and less pleased with the whole situation to put it very mildly.

The labs had done this. Not only had they tortured Sephiroth to the point were there was no forgiveness to get from Angeal. This fact alone was a good enough reason for killing that little bug Hojo with the means of very, slow, torture and for that matter he wasn't really forgiving towards any assistants or other scientists from down there.

Worse was, it wasn't all.

Not only had they done that, but they had tortured and experimented on so many others. It also seemed like they had in large numbers killed those who deserved to live and let those live who were so dangerous that they were a mortal danger to everyone, Angeal thought bitterly.

His mind burned with fury at the thoughts of what they had done to his friend. They had tortured him beyond any reasonable limit for the "science" they did down there.

He or Genesis had never got any particular details, but it was enough to look into Sephiroth's eyes when he went off to the labs for checking to see the fear that he hid from everyone else in the world. When Sephiroth came back from the lab trips he was, instead of refreshed and healed as it could possibly be supposed for someone to be after supposed healing was he torn up and wounded. He usually wanted the company of no one but the two of them when he came back and were usually very pale and quiet for a week or two. During this time the mere mentioning of the labs, Hojo or anything that could be associated with them made him shiver like a lamb before slaughter.

Zack was surprisingly silent during the time. That was odd considering his usual happy self but no one mentioned anything; the atmosphere was enough to keep their moods down and their mouths calmly shut.

Sephiroth who had been silent for some time finally drew a deep breath.

"I only wanted to add a little something on the topic of the hospital section" he said with something indefinable in his voice that made them all listen to his calm and low voice. "I have never been called there. You two know that before you both basically dragged me away from Hojo's claws I lived there" he said and looked at Genesis and Angeal.

He continued after drawing a deep breath. "There was never any need for me to be sent to the hospital section. As I didn't know about anything else being an option for me I didn't mind. Then, not that long ago after a hard and long mission I returned here. I was tired to the brink of exhaustion, our troops had been decimated to the point where we were twenty returning. I followed the stream of the others and didn't mind. I ended up in the hospital section. It was the first time I was there. I was, to be honest chocked to see the difference."

Angeal said nothing but a small muscle above his right eye twitched slightly as he restrained himself not to interrupt Sephiroth. Naturally was it news for Sephiroth to be taken to a place where there was actual and genuine care for the patients not just a result to achieve and forms to fill out.

Since no one interrupted him, Sephiroth continued.

"I wasn't sent there again and I didn't protest. It simply never worked to protest down there."

He had learnt that simple fact a very long time ago in the means of merciless pain caused by needles and stainless steel in the cruel, coldblooded hands of Hojo.

"But last time we were out all three you came with us to the hospital section Seph." Genesis realized suddenly.

Sephiroth blinked and nodded. The darkness in his thoughts were gone as sudden as it had appeared. Gone were the mix of the thoughts of the deep ice cold depths of never ending torture in the name of science and the, oh so delicate touch of the forbidden, always very deeply hidden thoughts, of revenge.

"Yes I were with you, the time before that I was sent to the labs and the time before that to the hospital wing. Something have changed, I would set the date of the bigger change to one and a half year ago."

"Something is happening here that isn't open to the public." Angeal stated uneasily a wrinkle at his forehead, he didn't like all the secrets that had clearly been hidden within the walls of the very building that they stood in.

"You are right, and I don't like it a bit" Genesis said, nodded a little and all suddenly twitched a little at a particularly rude comment from his whispering fierce demons.

He wanted desperately to shout back to them, to crush them, to burn them to ashes, to make them suffer in any way possible. He tried to defend himself with rage instead of letting the hopelessness take over. It didn't really work as well as he had hoped for since he figured that it was kind of hard to torture something that seemed to be on the inside of his own head. But he thought he could stand it a little better in that way anyway.

"I think we should find some light and try to read that folder" Cloud said. "It might reveal what has been going on here."

"Yes that's a good idea" Sephiroth answered and fingered the folder slightly.

"What do you think of it, Zack?" Angeal said "Where do you think we would find a flashlight of anything around here?"

"Zack what do you think?" Genesis asks as there was no response. That was uncommon for Zack.

"Zack?" Sephiroth looked at him through the darkness with a small concerned wrinkle on his forehead. It wasn't until then that they realized that Zack had been very quiet for a long while. They all looked at him.

"Zack, are you all right?" Cloud asked and touched his friends arm. He was very pale.

"Yes I am just fine" Zack said, slightly absent.

He wasn't. There where someone laughing manically. It frightened him to the point where he thought that his blood would freeze in his veins.

The others didn't press the point; it was after all quite natural to be a bit scared with everything going on around them.

With a slow patience the small group moved forwards to the next office. They found a neat and clean room where obviously no one had been killed. No flashlight though.

After a couple of offices, Zack got more and more impatient. The fact that they still hadn't found a flashlight didn't help him. He constantly looked around himself and twitched from time to time when the distant, mad laughter started once again.

The door of the next office was broken but hard to open; the stench in there was not that bad. Inside the doors they discovered a pile of wreckage, piled up to stop the something from breaking the door. It hadn't worked, the inhabitant of the office where ripped in very fine pieces and where to be found all over the walls, the floor and the ceiling.

"More than one person has taken shelter here." Genesis stated as he looked around.

"By the look and smell of it, this is where this fellow has been slaughtered." Angeal stated "Then some others-" he pointed at particularly bloody parts of the wall "have tried to take shelter here and it has obviously failed."

"The something have made a clean hose here and dragged of the bodies. Here is a shoe and here are marks in the blood" Sephiroth added, he had been taking a look around the room. "And I have found a flashlight, here, standing on one of the whole bookshelves."

A loud growling noise from somewhere way to near them for their liking, interrupted their discussion and their trail of thoughts. They all froze to the spot. No one dared to move. It was something, and it was coming, for them, fast.


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: 10th chapter, yay! Now that it is getting somewhere I will ask for reviews. Got an opinion? Just go ahead and tell me in any way you like! Since the two of us writing this would very much like to know what you think of this story :)

Something was coming, and by the sound of it, something larger than the thin monster they met first.

Heavy footsteps scratching the tiled floor with claws they could only imagine and the dark growling sound echoed down the hall. They all thought it sounded a bit like a behemoth, yet not at all.

Genesis was the only one with a weapon, and if this thing was indeed something alike a behemoth, then they wouldn't be able to fight it off. They could most likely run away from it, but Cloud didn't have the mako boost they had, he would fall behind, they couldn't risk the life of a friend, especially not the youngest one.

Hide. That was their best option.

Even if the previous occupants of the room had failed to use the office as a hiding place, they could always pray for the being to pass them by.

Sephiroth was the first to think off this and silently told everyone to hide. All of them found their own hiding spots. Sephiroth hid beneath the desk, Genesis behind a bookshelf moved away from the wall barely enough to fit a person, Angeal behind a torn couch probably used for guests to the office, Zack behind a large pile of debris and Cloud hid inside a large cardboard box.

Then they were silent.

The thing came closer and when they could tell it was just outside their room, the worst thing that could happen, occurred. The debris still blocking the door slightly was forcefully smashed away, the door went with it too, and the growling echoed in the room.

A repeating sniffing made it clear that the thing had a good sense of smell obviously. Claws scratched on the floor as it took another few steps into the room, everyone holding their breaths by now.

From behind the couch Angeal dared to take a peak, and then wished he hadn't. It was dangerous. What was he thinking?

He could only see half the being, not the front of it though. In the dark he could tell the being was walking on four legs, a long tail swayed lightly and reached all the way out the door, the body was thinner than expected but obviously very muscular, like the whole thing was made out of only muscle and the claws on its hind legs was bent and larger than his own head. He retreated behind the couch and shivered at the thought of those claws attacking a human being.

The whispers for help that Sephiroth heard wasn't echoes anymore; right now they were screams, like there were people in the same room screaming for help. Cold sweat was running down his forehead and he tried concentrating on the claws of the being that was getting closer to the desk.

Zack too took a peak from behind the debris and made absolutely sure not to look straight at the being, only observe it through the corner of his eye. What he could see was that the being had something alike a mane on its back, like a behemoth, he could also see the thing closing up to what he knew was Sephiroth's hiding place. The evil laughs he heard turned dark and excited, like they were eager to know what the being would do to his friend. He almost buried himself in the debris and wished as much as he could that his friend would not be discovered.

Cloud was fighting against crying with the other voices, never had he been this frightened before. He closed his eyes shut with silent tears of fear for what could happen, both for himself and his friends, trickling down his cheeks and biting his lip till it started bleeding to keep from making any sound.

Genesis' whispering voices were challenging him, criticizing his ability as a SOLDIER, that he was a coward that can't even fight off one single monster to save his friends. It was driving him mad. He shouted back at the voices in his mind and tried to hide behind a shield of toughness, but it did not work.

Frustration overtook and he held up his materia and leaned out from his hiding place just as the monster jumped up with its front legs onto the desk with claws easily the same size as his own head. He drew in a breath to gain confidence, which now lead to him revealing his presence as the monster turned its three heads towards him.

The whispers suddenly changed to call him stupid and a fool who easily could be tricked into reckless decisions. His mind was getting numb by then. The being he stared straight at didn't help his state of mental health either as it placed down one of its fleshy paws on the floor again, staring intently at the potential prey.

The head to its right had a behemoth like mouth and thin long horns pointing straight up, the head to its left was the only with a nose, its bottom jaw seemed to be ripped off, or maybe it was meant to look like that, with the tongue hanging down and it had horns that twisted around like a goats, the head in the middle seemed to have a mouth that had melted together, then ripped open with still some pieces of flesh holding onto the upper and lower jaw, it had large horns just like a behemoth and its whole head looked a tiny bit like bone, and the eyes of the being was nonexistent. Still Genesis felt the being staring straight into the very core of his soul.

His conscious was slipping away and his ability to think fading, as was everything in front of his eyes and he dropped his materia to the floor and it rolled away. The light sound of the stone hitting the floor alerted everyone in the room.

Negative thoughts, confusion and just the feeling of wanting everything to disappear resulted with everything in front of Genesis eyes faded to dark and he fell towards the floor behind the bookshelf with a thud, alerting everyone in the room with worry once again.


	11. Chapter 11

The four people that were still conscious were driven further and further towards the edge of insanity that was lurking not far away from them when they heard the creature sniff in the air. It halted and turned around completely at the sound of Genesis' body hitting the floor.

It didn't cast a second glance at anything as it decided that a good meal never ever had harmed it. If it found something else later that also counted as eatable there was no shame on that.

It approached the bookshelf behind which Genesis lay unconscious. The long claws were making marks in the floor and the loud cruel sound of long, razor sharp claws against the flat hard surface where making their skin crawl and driving them all mad with horror and tension.

Then something snapped in the mind of one of the persons. He knew very well that it was complete and absolutely an action of suicide and he didn't care a bit about it. Genesis and Angeal was the first people who had shown him any mercy at all. And more than that, they had shown friendship when he had thought that he was far below such things and that he didn't deserve such kindness.

Sephiroth threw the desk over and grabbed it on one end and hit the monstrous being hard with the other end. It didn't hurt it much at all, but it resulted in a reaction. The large, three headed thing turned around fast as a reptile and shredded a big part of the heavy desk in pieces with its claws, its jaws ajar, fangs bared and ready to bite.

"Hey, you idiot! You little scum of a thing, come here, come here, come here!" a voice yelled. It was Zack. He had jumped out in front of the pile of debris and were now throwing bricks and parts from the ceiling at the creature.

He was only half aware about how he had got there, but some basic part of his brain had been taught that you stuck together with your friends, no matter what happened and if they were going to die then was covering not the way he would prefer.

It turned around half by half, not sure about what to do, so it accidently swiped Cloud and the box he was hiding inside a bit to the side so that he was now laying, and still covered by the box, right in front of the door. Angeal realized the danger Cloud was in if they really would manage to make the creature go away, or if they were going to try to flee from it, and the very great and immediate danger that Zack was in.

He grabbed a few half crushed ornaments that where spread all over the floor and threw them at the monster.

"You are a rat of a monster come and get me. I am here for you to take!" Angeal shouted as he had realized that they had to confuse the beast as much as possible to achieve getting any reaction at all from it, any other action then eating them, that was.

It turned around once again, more at Angeal's shouting than anything else. All the shouting and yelling and throwing of bricks and stuff at it made it lose its already remarkably short temper. It went to the bookshelf, dragged Genesis out from the bookshelf by grabbing his legs and pulling him out, very much like a cat pulling a rat out of its hole and then it turned itself towards Sephiroth who were the one shouting the loudest, all of its heads focused at him.

Suddenly the creature turned around, with a growl of pain and with its tail it sent down a couple of already not so stable bookshelves over Angeal and Sephiroth who tried and failed to get away from them.

At that moment Cloud had gathered enough sense to get out of the box. He had got up to his feet somehow and with a piece of metal found on the floor he had attacked the long tail of the monstrous thing that was threatening to have them all for dinner. Clouds knees seemed to be very near to giving in and he was shaking from fear. Tears where trickling down his face and joined the small stream of blood dripping from his lip. But he stood up as straight as he could, trying to be brave and do something even now when he was unarmed. The metal piece was no longer in his hand but nailed a good bit into the creature's tail. He gave it a grin and as it snapped after him he backed off a few steps trying to lure it to follow him out of the room and into the corridor.

It was hesitant on leaving the room, food was not anything that it was used to have plenty of and it knew that there are other beings around that are just as hungry as it was itself.

Zack, now the one closest to the door threw a part of a broken chair as hard as he could at the monster, grabbed a few stones and bricks that happened to be within arm's reach and tried to make it for the door. He did somehow make it all the way without getting thorn into pieces by the ever hungry beast.

The mad dash for the door was only made possible by Angeal throwing a brick at the back of one of the creature's heads. Shaking off a bit of debris from himself he threw another stone at one of the other heads. It didn't really mind but it hesitated for a moment giving Zack the possibility to make it out of the door.

It was just about to turn around to get the two others who were trapped inside the room when Cloud shouted at it and banged a metal piece at the wall creating an annoying noise that made it turn its heads again. It seemed like the heads eyed the two men half buried in debris that already where looking for new things to grab to injure it with and then the two smaller ones outside in the corridor.

Zack threw another stone aiming for its head which together with the noise was enough to trigger its natural anger. It grabbed Genesis again and focused all three of its heads on the two figures in front of it that had started to run. It followed the easy prey.

And it knew it just as well as they did.

It was soon out of sight and the sound of it disappearing into the darkness made the remaining two members of their group sigh deeply.

Angeal and Sephiroth got out from the remains of the bookshelves in deep silence. When the two of them stood at the floor again without any rumble covering them or stopping them from moving as they wished, they looked at each other, both of them just as unsure about what to do.

Sephiroth carefully picked up the still closed folder and the military flashlight that had somehow survived the crashing and trashing. Angeal went for the fire materia that Genesis had dropped.

"I once had a chance to kill Hojo" Sephiroth said, his voice cold and stiff with just a slight hint of a tremble betraying that the cold gleam in his eyes were well contained white hot fury.

"And I didn't take it. There is nothing I have ever regretted that much. Right now I would really preferably kill myself, but that would be contra productive in any efforts to try to save at least one of them." He pocketed the folder and the sturdy flashlight and picked up a long metal bar and a piece of glass for weapons. The metal bar originally came from one of the better bookshelves.

"It would indeed" Angeal said. "Let's hope they split up and we might be able to save one of them" he said in a voice that where far from his usual steady and calm one, there were tears in the corner of his eyes at the thoughts of the younger ones chased to death by that thing and his childhood friend being dragged along unconscious.

He refused to think too closely of Genesis. His friend was guaranteed to be lost. He shivered a little. If he thought of it too much, he knew he wouldn't be able to continue a single step forwards.

It was a feeling deeper than grief. It was a big hole of despair that was eating at his heart, threatening to swallow his soul whole leaving his body an empty dead shell. He desperately tried to push it away from him so that he could focus.

Genesis was his oldest friend and like a brother to him, his logic told him that Genesis would be beyond saving and his heart picked the moment to allow it to be sealed away. Grief, sadness and sorrow had to be dealt with later, otherwise would he not manage.

He picked up a slightly shorter metal bar from the mess and a sharp piece of metal and gave Sephiroth a short nod. They had to keep going.

They ran, following the tracks once again. All of a sudden they heard a loud growling in the distance. They were not eager to know who of their friends that had met their fate. They were running faster than they ever had before, no thought of what would actually happen if they did reach the monster.

They stopped suddenly in a dead end. There was blood everywhere. Especially bloody was a place near the back of the corridor.

It was bloody, very, even to the point of the walls being soaked with the red liquid, the smell of the fresh blood sticking to their nostrils, even the walls where having deep cuts from claws.

The small pieces of flesh spread over the place were all that was left, that and a small tuft of black hair. They said nothing to each other but grieved their friend in silence as they turned their backs on the spot. Angeal was not only sad but also ashamed that he had caused the death of his trainee. Sephiroth grieved the "puppy" too; Zack had been a very good friend and a bringer of joy and happiness. They were silent. They pulled themselves together to face more mayhem and destruction. They continued.

They ran. Once again they followed the trail of marks leading them forwards. The marks disappeared, but they continued to run, none of them willing to let go of their last gleam of hope.

Suddenly they skidded to a halt when the corridor made a sharp turn. Here there were no marks. But there was an open door to a small office. They looked into the room. It was painstakingly empty. The chair by the desk was overthrown and the couch was destroyed. But they both froze at the sound that reached their ears, the sound of breathing. It was something in there. They went in.

The couch that was overthrown and wrecked stood leaning against the wall. The sturdy desk and a big plant pot with the remains of some flower arrangement in it were stopping it from moving anywhere. It formed a tilted v against the wall. They jumped back as they both saw something in the narrow space down there.

They silently dragged away the couch and there Genesis lay, sleeping on his back as if he were in his own bed. His head covered with his arms and remarkably enough were he lying at the old and thorn pillows of the bottom of the couch. His clothes were torn in pieces, wounds all over him; the blood was very clearly visible against the light grey coat he was lying on. They tried to wake him. And to their own surprise they succeeded. A very groggy Genesis opened his eyes and tried to make them focus.

"Happy to see you two" he muttered and tried desperately to force the world to stop spinning.

"How did you make it?" Angeal wondered.

Sephiroth didn't even dare to speak yet.

"Let's just say I wasn't here last time I dosed of" Genesis said and looked around a bit, surprised and a bit confused. "I was somewhere else, the thing put me down in a room much bigger than this, and then it gave me a knock in the head. It wanted a dinner, the foul thing, but didn't want me awake"

"How's your legs?" Sephiroth asked a bit concerned.

"I don't know. It hurts a bit but well. I haven't examined them so I don't know. My arm hurt more. Why?" Genesis sat up and looked at his feet. They were a bit bruised and had a few scratches on them but were otherwise ok.

"It dragged you out by your feet Genesis" Angeal said.

"It did?"

"Yes it did and in the overall commotion that it caused it managed to get Zack and Cloud running." Sephiroth said in a low voice. "We haven't found them yet." He didn't need to exchange a look with Angeal to know what to say.

"They are gone..?" Genesis said and shook his head. The most probable loss of the two younger ones brought grief to his heart. But there was no time for revenge or for grief. Now was time for getting back on his feet and getting out there again.

"My feet don't hurt at all though" he said for a positive note and looked at them.

"Now, how did, that happen?" Angeal muttered in wonder.

"Never underestimate a good pair of shoes" Genesis said and looked at his feet in disbelief.

"You said that you hadn't taken a look at your feet" Sephiroth added slowly.

"No I hadn't" he answered simply.

"Then why are your feet naked and your shoes and even your socks neatly placed by your head?"

"I don't know" he said and reached for them, the movement made his body first chook at the pain then disappearing and the full pain in his left arm hit him. He checked the arm and muttered many things that were less than beautiful through gritted teeth.

"Someone has bandaged your arm" Sephiroth said surprised.

"It looks like we have an anonymous helper somewhere around" Angeal said.

"Yes it does, but let's move on" Genesis said, worry in his voice and got his shoes on in a hurry.

They helped him up and he could walk rather well. They got out of the room and started walking down the corridor. Genesis was rather dizzy and had several small wounds and an endless amount of bruises and stumbled forwards. The two others helped him forwards.

They heard a sound form somewhere in a corridor parallel to the one in which they were in. In the quiet building it echoed through everything. It was what they assumed to be footsteps and after the running feet came the thing that drenched all other sound, the trashing of the beast.

"One of them is still running" Angeal whispered.

They both felt really sorry for the poor Cloud, he could never outrun the thing.

They hurried down the corridor and headed into the open room in the middle, they saw the figure running out from the other corridor and across the room. He ran straight to the door opposite of where he came from, the one leading into the new corridor and they were forced to watch as he tried to open the door, which failed, it had been blocked.

The creature smashed away the doors of the corridor, still locked on target. They knew that they weren't fast enough; dragging Genesis along or not but they couldn't abandon their poor friend.

Then, as the creature was about to slash its murderous claws through the body of its much smaller victim, something happened. A light appeared between the young man and the beast.

In the blue light they saw that the hair of the person was black, not blonde. It was Zack. They didn't think of it. In the blue light a figure appeared. A young teenage girl dressed in a blue and white dress; her whole appearance shining. She raised her arms into the air and a barrier of blue light appeared to protect Zack from the creature. It attacked the barrier with burning fury. The girl looked at the creature. It stopped trying to break through the barrier of blue light that she had made and all three of its heads concentrated on her. She screamed. It was a loud shriek, high-pitched enough to even break the small round windows in the doors to the other corridors. The thing fell down to the floor, trying to cover its heads with its paws, its long claws tearing against each other. She stopped screaming and the monster fled through the same door as it had come from and the girl disappeared as quickly as she had got there. The blue light was, however, for some reason dwelling in the room, slowly fading away.

They looked at their exhausted friend, hurrying over to him.

"I have never been so happy to see you" Sephiroth said and gave him a concerned look.

"I never thought I would see you again" Zack said, his knees shaking, he took a steady grip of the wall and breathed heavily.

"Nice to see you Zack" Genesis said and patted him slightly on the back. "Never thought I would say it, but having to face the fact, I have discovered that I actually like you pretty much, pup."

"Yeah" Zack answered, "Really glad to see you, I am," He drew a deep breath before continuing, "But, well, so to speak, it's no use to look for Cloud. The stupid chocobo sacrificed himself for me." The last sentence slipped out of Zack as nothing more than a whisper

"We found a dead end that looked pretty bad" Angeal said and gave Zack a look. He handed over the piece of metal as improvised weapon and they started to walk towards the door that weren't blocked, all of them deciding silently not to talk about what they had just faced and nearly got killed by but instead focusing on getting away and trying to save their own lives.

A long silence followed Angeals words.

"It chased me to that place and then it was about to attack me" Zack finally said, breaking the silence "I dodged the claws a few times and I just had the feeling that the little game of cat and rat was about to end when Cloud suddenly appeared. He jumped out in front of it, holding a thin metal bar and hitting the wall with it. He told me to run, since I had a chance to get away from it. I couldn't let him down but he just wouldn't listen at me. I ran. I suppose it finished him of pretty fast. It looked like it had lured many people there. I got away and though that I lost a piece of my hair and a very good friend, but not my life. Then it came after me again."

It had gone some time now, Zack didn't talk really fast and everyone could see how much it hurt him.

There was a sudden noise from above them. Something was once again coming after them.

"Not more now!" Sephiroth muttered in a low, less hopeful voice.

Something all of a sudden fell down, on them, landing without any grace at all tumbling down on top of Angeal and Sephiroth and knocked them down. It didn't attack. They took a look at the dirty, brown-grey figure. Zack ruffled the hair of the person. For it was a person. The hair, previously completely brown and grey was now brighter and blond in places.

"Air" he muttered and letting himself sink down lying on the floor obeying to his spinning head.

The world was defiantly there but he feared that his eyesight was fading away.

"You are alive" said Genesis simply. The others were too shocked to say anything.

Cloud coughed a couple of times and breathed heavily. "Finally, air" he breathed. Tears were streaming down his face together with the sweat. They looked at him in disbelief.

"Turns out.., that at least.., sometimes.., you have.., a something.., for being.., smaller than.., everyone else" he said and breathed heavily. They sat down all of them. It was obvious that the poor Cloud couldn't continue right now and they could drag him along. But with Genesis injured and Zack barley able to walk they wouldn't get anywhere fast.

"I've.., never.., ever.., been so afraid.., in my.., life..." he panted trying to get his body to work enough for his eyes to see anything.

Zack sat down closest to Cloud's head and tried to get hold of the situation all in all. He was very pale.

"What happened, Cloud?"

"I, I made that creature not follow Zack. Then as it trashed the walls I saw a vent shaft and a chance for escape. I climbed into it. It bit me in the leg but I didn't feel it" he said and they noticed the dark mark on his legs and the marks and wounds from big teeth in his skin.

"How did you find us then?"

"I saw everything from up there" he said, "then you just disappeared. I couldn't find you. The vent shafts don't go in the same directions as the corridors. I ended up crawling around forwards and forwards with less and less hope until I saw a light. It where leading me on forwards and then I heard you guys. Now I am here. But what now?"

He had got back his breath, but was not ready to move on just yet, that was for sure. It went quiet; they sat in the semi darkness.

"I think it might be time to read that folder" Genesis said quietly, as if not really daring to bring his voice to disturb the silence and maybe bring out something else from the dark depths of the buildings shadows.


	12. Chapter 12

Sephiroth made a sound off agreement and picked up the secured folder and flashlight, lighting it up as he did so. They all felt relived for some reason to at least be in a familiar light instead of mystic light made by unspeakable powers. Angeal took the flashlight while Sephiroth opened the slightly blooded folder and picked out the undamaged content.

To their surprise, it wasn't any documents; it was letters, simple reports and different agreements, he even got an unlabeled CD in his hand. He put back the CD since it was obvious they couldn't do anything with it, not even if they had a computer, there were no electricity after all.

The papers that were dated was very old, from the time the trio only was 3rd classes and forward to what was a year ago, but nothing of present time, some weren't even dated at all but seemed to be very old as well and then there were some damaged ones, not natural damage though, certain parts of the papers were cut out, probably to prevent out-standers like them to fully understand the papers.

To make things easier, Sephiroth sorted out the papers in groups of what kind of paper it was and then tried sort the papers in each pile after date, so they could be a little easier to follow. He then chose the pile of letters to start skimming through, Angeal started on the pile of agreements to help speeding up the reading. Names and important lines or words were cut out, proving the texts to be very difficult to understand what they were about. After a short while Genesis got bored by only sitting there and look at his friends reading and started on the last group of papers left, the reports pile, neither Cloud nor Zack felt like reading anything.

Sephiroth, being the first who finished with his pile spoke up about the things he had read "It seems like the hospital wing really had some kind of connection to the labs after all."

They looked at him rather uncomfortable. They had already suspected it, but having it confirmed disturbed them more.

"Though, it seems like in the end they didn't get along."

"Maybe they didn't agree with each other on different things?" Cloud suggested. But Sephiroth shook his head.

"They seem to have had started on a project on their own, the labs found out. Then things went downhill from there."

Genesis shivered, he had been a favorite patient to the hospital wing, what if he was part of their project.

"From these agreements I've read it seems as they concern SOLDIER the most, sometimes certain ones as well, but there are no names." Angeal said putting down the paper, not bothering to continue on the other ones.

"But all the missing words, they must be somewhere, right?" Zack questioned.

"It's possible, but I doubt it actually." Angeal said and shrugged.

Genesis continued on the simple reports made by the medics and doctors from the hospital section. He felt a bit unease reading them.

"That project you mentioned" he started still looking down at the paper "it seemed to be about diseases. New, undiscovered ones. Possibly diseases caused by the labs experiments."

Genesis had a somewhat shaky voice, he visited the labs regularly, and the hospital wing always insisted him to come as often as possible. He looked up at his friends, who looked at him and listening, he had a small hint of worry and fear in his eyes.

No one said anything though.

The papers went back down into the folder and they sat there for some more time.

"I wish I could tell where we are exactly." Sephiroth muttered, he knew where his office was, a few floors above them, otherwise he didn't even think about taking a single step onto any of the other office floors.

"Well, I can tell for sure this is the last office floor anyways." Angeal commented "The next 5 floors are the hospital section."

"Maybe we should take and get going before that demon catches our scent again." Zack said with a hint off worry in his voice and they all rose, Angeal helped Genesis to his feet.

The flashlight was turned off so the darkness could act like a hiding cover for anything with eyes and so that they wouldn't waste any batteries that could possibly come to use later on. Sephiroth took the flashlight and pocketed it together with the folder.

"Ah, yes, Genesis" Angeal said when they started walking, earning the attention from his childhood friend "I know this belongs to you." He held up the faint glowing Fire materia to the other, but Genesis didn't take it

"You better have it." He said instead, surprising Angeal. He knew how much Genesis liked his materia, he was the one using it most out of all of them, and he took pride in owning so many different ones too, he was the only one in ShinRa who owned real summon materia, the other in the building was lab made and would eventually be useless after some time.

Angeal decided to protest "I believe you should keep it, I can always use a temporary weapon of any kind, but you can barely use your other arm and you stagger when you walk, you need to defend yourself in one way or another and a close combat weapon won't help you much, the materia only requires one arm, nothing more, so it's the weapon best fit for your current state." He said with the voice he always used when he lectured someone about honor, pride and dreams.

Genesis was quiet for a second before he chuckled and took his materia, happy that his friend still stood strong whiles half of them where on the brink of breakdown.

Even if it was intended or not, Angeal's small speech, that was so much alike the ones he was most known for, cheered all of them up a bit, they at least got a smile to their faces and a sense of familiarity that some things still hasn't changed in this madness.


	13. Chapter 13

A/N: 2 years... A lot has happened and this story was kinda left abandoned, despite the fact there are soooo many chapters laying on my computer waiting to be uploaded. I thought maybe I should try and actually upload all those chapters, since there were a few who actually enjoyed reading this horror trip.

My personal interest isn't that strong for this story anymore, but I want to put some time into it and refine the edges. I've updated almost all past chapters and I'm going to try upload the other dusty chapters.

I won't say "It's back!" just yet, I have to prove my words first...

* * *

><p>They continued through the darkness of the corridors. It still stank. But they were getting used to it, somewhat. Zack was silently fighting a war with his inner mocking laughter, he wouldn´t let the madness win.<p>

Sephiroth's voices were still very much there, but they were not that heartbreakingly desperate in their cries for help anymore. They weren't silent, but they weren't screaming either.

Cloud was happy that the crying had gone back to the quiet sobbing as it had started as.

Genesis was also grateful. The voices insulting everything he hold dear hadn´t gone quiet, but he had other things on his mind right now, like for example how to manage to keep up with the others.

Suddenly they all heard a sound. Something alive. A low dragging sound was heard. Then it stopped. They continued with care. When they got out of the corridor into a larger area they were all equally disgusted. It stank and there were bodies everywhere. Not just that but they had been slaughtered in the most brutal and inhuman ways.

They saw something small move into a corner and approached it slowly, very careful not to step on some of the bodies. It sat still, looking at them with something in the yellow, shining eyes that they couldn´t define. When they continued to stare at it, it picked up a bone and started gnawing on it. It didn´t seem to care about them.

"Come, come here, let´s take a look at you" Angeal called in a low calm voice, like the one you use for calling a shy dog to you.

It took the bone in its moth and "walked" forwards on all four. When it came closer they saw how thin it was, barley more than a skeleton. It wore the sad remains of a very worn and torn something that they supposed was attire from the labs, but all the dirt and the countless bloodstains made it impossible to see what it had been. It had light hair and its hands and feet where covered by a short fur. It also had short claws and two pointed furry ears, dark black against the lighter hair.

However what they all noted which made Sephiroth draw a short breath in something between anger and fear was the chains along it´s body. It had been chained hands and feet together and around its neck hung a big collar of steel.

When no one hurt it, it simply sat down next to the closest body and continued with what it had before, to eat. They were all rather disgusted as it picked up one of the lose pieces of flesh and started chewing on it.

"Do you think it understands what we say?" Cloud wondered softly.

It nodded.

"Can you talk?" Genesis continued and sat down on a spot with less blood and human flesh.

It shook its head with something in its eyes.

"Did you kill them?" Angeal has sunken down to his knees so that their eyes where at the same level.

It shook it´s head violently so the chains around it rattled.

"Then who did?" Sephiroth continued, also he kneeling not far from the thing.

It gestured towards the bigger double doors leading to one of the bigger corridors and shivered.

There was a big hole in one of them and stains of blood on the other. They all looked that way and shivered.

"Here" Cloud said. "I found a something that I think might help opening that lock," he held up something very small and glimmering.

The thing looked happier at the thought of getting rid of the heavy chains. Cloud sat down and somehow succeeded in prying open the locks that previously tied the creature's limbs together.

"So you are the one who always manages to steal my locked in hidden sweets" Angeal muttered, "I have blamed it all on Zack for I don´t know how long."

"Yes you see I am very good at picking locks."

The thing stretched its muscles and drew a deep breath. Then it rose to two legs. Now they saw that its back was bent to the side in an unnatural angle, the wrists were bloody from the creatures trashing in the hole it previously was bound in, the neck was scarred and the throat had unremoved stitches in it, the wound was probably what stopped him from speaking.

In short, a better view weren't really a thing that made the poor creature's general appearance improve much so to say. It had many scars and wounds and looked hungrily at the pieces of meat on the floor.

It went forwards and touched Genesis´ bandaged arm and whispered in a raspy voice "Sorry".

"Was that you?" Genesis answered.

It shook it´s head and then suddenly stopped and listened, the pointed furry ears were twitching at something.

"Move. Quick." It hurried on before them into a corridor and they thought it was better to follow it. They didn´t move that very quick, but very silent.

"Interesting way of walking" Genesis commented looking at the poor being's very quiet half hopping limping.

"Broken, wrongly healed back as far as I can see" Angeal replied a bitter tone in his voice.

"And probably some other injuries" Cloud added as he noticed the way the thing limped and seemed to be in quite a bit of pain.

When they came to a T-crossing their grateful beast stopped.

"Thank you, I will not, forget." It said lowly and bowed to them then it held up a door.

They passed through it and heard how it was closed with heavy metal bars from the outside. Then they heard the feet of their helper and then in his tracks something else followed. With a roaring that sent them all to their knees, the being on the other side of the door dunderhead past them at full speed. Exhausted from pain and mentally challenging experiences they remained sitting.


	14. Chapter 14

"We can't continue resting in the halls." Angeal said and forced his tired body up again. "It's too dangerous."

Everyone except Sephiroth made a tired sigh. They didn't have a clock, but it was obviously past midnight by now. They all understood that it was dangerous to stay in the halls if that monster was still looming around the floor, so the rest got up reluctantly.

They went forward slowly with tiredness. Genesis didn't complain though, now he could keep up with the rest a little easier with his slight limping. Right now they had one goal; find a safe place to rest in.

After just a few minutes of walking they found another pair of stairs, a chance to get away from the being that almost killed half of them, of course they took the chance to venture down. Though, they did only walk one floor, deciding to find a room close to the stairs so they wouldn't have to search the whole floor again. A few doors away from the stair cases was a rather undamaged reception, probably were they recorded the latest arrived patients and such. There were two couches in the room too, which seemed very inviting, no one hesitated to sit down in them. Zack and Cloud sat down in one while Genesis, Sephiroth and Angeal sat down in the one opposite. The door was still attached to its hinges too so they could close the door as well, which was good.

"We should still have someone to sit up as guard." Angeal said, apparently he was the only one enough awake to think all details through completely at the moment.

He didn't blame any of them for it though. All his friends suffered from voices in their heads, he didn't know how it felt but was pretty sure it does take a lot more of their energy than necessary.

"Shall we all have a little time each?" Sephiroth questioned "I can guard first if so." He straightened his sitting position to Angeal's left showing that he was fully able to stay awake some more time.

"I do not wish to take the second time." Genesis stated in an annoyed voice caused by tiredness on the other end of the couch.

"How about the third then?" Angeal questioned and earned a slow nod and tired grunt as agreement from his friend. "What about you Zack, Cloud?" he then asked but was met by silence from the other side.

They sat leaning onto each other peacefully making Angeal shook his head with a smile.

"Seems like they are already asleep." Sephiroth noted with a tired voice.

"You can rest Seph; I'll take the first guard." Angeal said and patted his friend on the shoulder.

It didn't take long for everyone to be asleep, leaving Angeal as the guard of their safety.

After a few seconds he realized he couldn't sit in the soft couch or he would fall asleep too, so he rose and walked around in the room. Books, papers and folders lay sprawled around the floor and he tried to avoid them so that he wouldn't make any unwanted noises. The chair by the reception desk looked to be not as comfortable as the couches, it would do, he sat there instead and watched the sleeping silhouettes of his friends. He was so happy, so very happy that that demon hadn't gotten their lives. He wished he could do more for their wounds though. They were on the hospital floors right now; there could be a chance of finding a Cure materia somewhere, but he wasn't sure. The hospital didn't work with materia, it wasn't reliable enough to heal someone completely, it couldn't remove bullets buried deep in a chest, nor could it stitch together fatal wounds. It was more used for healing minor wounds and stop bleeding. Maybe it could at least help Genesis, so that he stopped limping and Cloud who also had a wounded leg, not as many wounds as Genesis though, but large enough to deal him pain when he walked.

He started looking in the desk for anything interesting, but only found the latest check in and checkouts which wasn't of interest. He yawned lightly and looked around the room instead. At the wall to the right there was archives and a large bookshelf, a large potted plant stood in between them and gave the room some softness.

By the wall to his left there were more large bookshelves and a pair of red shiny eyes in the middle of the wall.

Angeal froze.

He stared at the red shining dots and decided it were just ordinary lights, until they blinked slowly. He looked at them a bit closer and noted that the eyes were inside the wall. How did that work he wondered and rose from his seat again and walked towards the wall cautiously.

It was hard to tell if the eyes followed him, there were no pupils, just large blinking red dots. A few steps closer to the wall and he then noticed that the eyes was inside a mirror that hung on the wall. He quickly turned around to see if there was anything on the opposite end of the room, but it was as dark as ever.

More confused than worried he turned back towards the mirror and noticed some other shining blinking dots. Taking a few steps in front of the mirror he discovered that the whole mirror was full of the shining blinking eyes, all in different colors, red, yellow, blue, green, pink, purple, everything! All in different sizes and pairs. Some had pairs of three eyes; some were just a lone eye; some were a whole bunch. Not only that, but the eyes shone both in front of his own reflection and behind it.

He didn't feel threatened by the expressionless eyes, but it did make him feel uncomfortable. So he went to pick the mirror away from the wall so he could turn the glass towards the wall and get rid of the watching eyes. As he lifted it off the wall, all the eyes suddenly changed to red and he looked in the mirror in confusion. The reflections of his friends in the couches suddenly turned their now red shining eyes towards him so fast it startled Angeal with a gasp and he dropped the mirror.

It hit the floor and made a sound of cracking glass. He grabbed the top of the mirror preventing it from falling wholly onto the floor and completely break the glass.

Someone made a disapproving noise behind him and he turned his head with wide eyes to see if everything was still okay. They were all still asleep. Genesis shifted around in his sleep and was now leaning on Sephiroth's shoulder, who was slightly shifting in his sleep as well.

Angeal sighed and turned the mirror around, leaning it towards the wall before walking back to the desk to sit down. He put his head in his hands, deciding that this has been a very tiring day. He listened to a rhythmic light clicking sound that made him feel a little at ease, until he actually recognized the sound from the first monster they met up there.


	15. Chapter 15

Angeal was absolutely terrified. What should they do? They couldn´t rush out of the room, then it would hear them and they were in no fitting state to take a fight right now.

He woke Sephiroth softly. The moment their eyes met Angeal knew that Sephiroth had also heard the sound and understood what it meant. They woke the others without a sound being made. Silent as ever they grabbed their possible weapons once again. Hoping that they wouldn´t have to use them, that the creature would pass.

There was only one door; they'd be cornered if the creature decided to break in. The sound continued.

Genesis´ inner demons where openly harassing him now; calling him weak and a coward that let his friends die for him. The other ones did not really feel that great either to put it mildly.

They heard the louder and louder sound of metal and scrapping. The blood froze in their veins as they heard a loud crash. It had broken something outside in the corridor. They weren't moving a muscle. They stood absolutely still. They heard a loud sound, like metal scrapped against metall. A long claw broke though the steel surface of the door. It was removed and a blood red eye appeared instead, "gargch" they heard the creature growl lowly. Then it continued to break the door in pieces.

The moment all of the creatures claws broke through the door they all dropped on the floor. They did not know why, but it must have been some kind of instinct. Only a second later they heard a loud crashing sound and something rushed though the corridor and apparently ripped away the beast from the door. A long tongue licked the hole in the door a while later after the newly arrived beast apparently claimed the smaller one. But the thing didn't seem to see very well and so it continued.

They were as dead on the floor until they no longer could hear the sound of the creature. They got to their feet. On slightly shaky legs, for Clouds part very shaky legs, they picked up anything they thought worth still carrying with them and approached the door suspiciously. It was quiet. A bit too quiet, but none of them thought of it. They made their way out from the room and continued. They were not moving fast, but they were moving never the less.

Once again the little music box began to play. They continued worried by it. Zack in particular were very quiet. They entered a bigger opening in the corridor though a pair of whole doors. They were greeted by blue light. A group of five children sat in a circle, holding hands, all watching a music box in the middle that shone with a yellow light.

"Out there, there be bad things, out there creatures hurt." The children sang a song together with very small but happy voices. "Out there, there be monsters, out there, there be pain."

The group approached, but when they reached the circle of light the figures disappeared in thin air. They were all engulfed, at once by an overwhelming feeling of fear. They heard a loud roaring behind them that shook the building in its foundations. They did not understand what it was. When they once again heard the roaring they understood. It was not one thing. It was many. And they were closing up on them. The ice cold hand of fear gripped their hearts.

Cloud was almost frozen to the spot with fear. The crying was like the one from a tortured child. There was more than one crying voice though and there was more than one of the sobbing voices that tormented him greatly.

Sephiroth's inner voices were a real torture. They were now screaming desperately for help and in their cries for help he heard the shame and the grief of his own mind. Why did this happen? The lack of a sword by his side did nothing to ease his mind.

Genesis almost fell down to his knees at the voices´ harassments. They called him a black spot of shame on the shining surface of the Company´s history of courage and bravery and constantly insulted him, his belief in that he could make any SOLDIER at all.

Zack´s maniacal laughter was driving him to the brink of insanity by now.

Angeal turned around and saw hundreds of eyes in the darkness behind them. The roaring was heard again. They lost control of their bodies and sense, and ran for their lives. Sephiroth and Angeal last in line. Everyone helping each other forward. Sephiroth who saw how near Genesis was to fall every second grabbed him as he nearly knocked himself out on the remains of a broken door.

They continued. Cloud, the poor thing ran for his life. He would never fall behind. But he saw nothing. Angeal were sticking close to him, catching him a few times. They ran faster than Genesis or Cloud could. But fear is always the best of motivations.

When they were so finished that they could no longer continue the threat seemed to have disappeared. They slowed down and crashed all on the floor.

"Damnit" Genesis swore, struggling to get air to his lungs.

Sephiroth had realized that the group missed two members. Zack was half lying against a wall. But of the others there was no sign.


	16. Chapter 16

Angeal and Cloud was still running, not caring whether they were still being followed or not. They reached a T-crossing with large half open slide doors that they went through and took the first place that seemed fit for hiding and collapsed there.

Angeal catched his breath fast but Cloud sounded like he was suffocating; the poor boy needed some water, but if there were any to be found wasn't sure. Angeal looked around; they sat against the wall between a stretcher and a drapery. He couldn't see what was on the other side of the room but he guessed they had run into a care ward for the ones who would soon take their leave from the hospital. One thing that disturbed him greatly as he looked around was that he couldn't see any other than Cloud next to him. The only he could hear was Cloud's heavy breathing and nothing more.

"Damn." He said in a low voice and hit the floor with his fist. How could he forget to keep an eye on the rest? He was disappointed with himself.

"Is something wrong?" Cloud asked him with more controlled breathing now.

"We lost the others." Angeal answered. All he could do now was to at least keep Cloud safe until they could find the others.

"Will they be okay?" came a slightly worried voice and Angeal found himself that he actually couldn't answer the question for sure.

"If I know them right, they won't give up." Angeal said after some silence and put a hand on Cloud's shoulder.

They would rest a bit before continuing.

On another part of the floor, Sephiroth, Genesis and Zack dragged themselves up from the floor. They were all still tired, they had got 10 minutes of sleep at most and after all the running, those 10 minutes meant nothing anymore.

"We have to find Angeal and Cloud." Sephiroth stated and surprised Zack and Genesis who hadn't looked up until now, making Genesis swear again.

"We must have split in a crossing." He muttered and made a grunt of pain as his hurt leg ached something terribly from all the running.

"Well, I am not going back there!" Zack concluded with fear, making the laughters laugh towards his fear "Those things are probably still lurking!"

He had a point. If they went back to search for the other two, that would mean nothing if they walked straight into the pack of monsters. They continued down the hall whishing for their two friends to be safe.

Angeal and Cloud had started moving forward as well, keeping close to each other. It was obvious that many had been killed in this room, blood and flesh was lying splattered across the floor in the broad room.

Suddenly Angeal snapped up a sound from in front of them and he quickly moved behind one of the drapes with Cloud and hid. They could have turned and run, but backtracking wasn't something good and the familiar clicking sound was slow, indicating that the being probably hadn't seen them. Or so they hoped.

As the monster got closer they could make out the sound of something being dragged along the floor as well. As the monster got in eyesight for Angeal, he could see the thing had two heads on two long necks, one of the heads dragging something across the floor with its mouth. Brightly yellow shining eyes looked straight at them and Cloud tensed when he saw the eyes.

If it saw them in the dark, they were doomed. But to their surprise, and happiness, the monster turned away and continued down the hall, the head without the chunk of meat picked something on the floor and made a satisfied growl. They were left in silence. Then they continued forward.


	17. Chapter 17

Angeal could have sunken down on his knees and slept where he was. He hadn´t slept at all, not even relaxed. He didn´t of course, they couldn´t stay there. They walked out in the corridor and made their way as quiet as they could.

Cloud made a sudden jump. "If they would only shut up at some point I would be more than happy" Cloud muttered in a low voice.

"I understand that they must be really annoying."

Cloud muttered something as a response.

Angeal thought he could make out the words "hell", "bastards" and "burn" but he decided not to mention it.

They continued through the pitch black corridors. Two blinking green dots had at some point appeared in the darkness before them. They grew stronger. Angeal had since long talked himself into that they where lamps, of control of something. Cloud stopped suddenly.

"Angeal, don´t you see those green dots?"

"Do you?"

"What are they?"

The green dots blinked and disappeared. They remained frozen in their shoes. The dots appeared again. This time they were much bigger. Close enough to see that they had a black spot in each of them. They were eyes. They didn't move. They blinked again. They disappeared and appeared again. This time very close to them.

Angeal tried to silently move Cloud so that he protected him with his body. The eyes disappeared again. Angeal was now gripping his metal piece so hard that it was making bleeding wounds in his hand. He expected claws to rip him apart at any moment.

Nothing happened.

Cloud was now standing next to him but slightly behind his left shoulder. Something tapped Angeal on his right shoulder. He lunged for whatever it was and except for Cloud who he barely missed he reached trough nothing but air.

"I think we should take another path from here on" Cloud whispered softly.

A hand ruffled his hair and gave him a pat on the head.

"I understand that you are trying to make up for nearly hitting me with that metal thing of yours. But please don't touch me without warning. It makes me jumpy; you know I can't see you."

"I didn´t touch you" Angeal said in a low voice trying to hide his confusion and fear.

"Let´s continue" Cloud said nervously.

They did without further conversation.

After a while of walking in corridors not that dark Cloud accidently put his hand in his pocket.

"I have a knife?" he said in a low voice, slightly confused.

He pulled up a small army knife from his pocket.

"You couldn´t have thought of that a bit earlier?" Angeal wondered slightly confused.

"I don´t have any knife like this one." He removed the scabbard.

The blade was painted black and gave no reflection.

"No that looks very much more like one from the knife collection that Seph has. Why is it in your pocket?"

"Don´t ask me, it wasn´t there before!" Cloud answered and tested the blade in the air.

On another point of the mazelike floor another group tried to survive without going mad. They walked through the darkness. Right now they were in a corridor that brought Sephiroth years back in time. To other dark tunnels, in the same building but in another world. They were both long, dark and without windows. He shivered. This however didn´t exactly help him concentrate. They walked in silence, everyone fighting their inner demons.

Five very big blood red eyes shoved themselves for them in the dark. All of a sudden they were just there. They were frozen with fear their inner voices screaming at them. They felt as of the red eyes filled them with burning red light paralyzing them and making them unable to see.

"May the goddess have mercy on us" Genesis muttered.

Sephiroth gripped his glass piece so tightly it cut up his hand, he didn´t notice at all.

Zack where by now having very pale knuckles from gripping the metal piece that was his only defense.

They heard the something before them move towards them. It made a hungry sound and growled. They couldn´t move fast enough. They had unaware of the situation behind them backed away and were now at a dead end. The eyes approached. It opened a gigantic mouth with row after row with sharp teeth. The teeth were not more than five centimeters each but together they gleamed in the darkness in thousands.

They were speechless. That they should end like this!

One pair of small, yellow eyes was opened above the five red. Then there was a slashing, like steel through flesh and the eyes and the owner of them went down before their feet. They could not make out much in the darkness. Their eyes were not yet again used to it. But they saw a figure before them. It rose to its feet standing by a little pile of meat pieced. It had one head and two legs. But it had four arms and it´s long, sharp teeth where glimmering in the darkness. So were its three decimeter long claws. It made a movement, like when you shrug your shoulders and a knick with its hands and the claws where gone. It stood and looked at them for a moment. They didn´t move. Then it picked up the pieces of meat that it had slashed away from the monster and put them down in a torn, handmade backpack, holstered it and tightened the straps, made a happy cricking sound and disappeared again.

They were left confused in the darkness to discover that the four legged creature was not much bigger than a small pony but that it had a dousing big claws on its hind legs and on its front legs it had ten smaller claws on each paw. Also they discovered that the things neck was broken and heart and liver missing together with some other parts of the thing. It had a short thick fur that was striped with red and black stripes.

They hurried away from the strange encounter.


	18. Chapter 18

Angeal and Cloud had gone through a few corridors and reached some dead ends, but there hadn't been many more monsters or other weird encounters. It made them both happy and uneasy at the same time. Though, Angeal didn't think much anymore of what way they were going, he was becoming very tired, no matter that their situation was dangerous his body screamed for some rest.

Cloud too was very tired, but he had got at least some sleep, not much, but enough to keep him alert for some time. If he just was able to see more in the darkness he would probably notice the swaying Angeal did from time to time. He did notice his companions swaying though, when he suddenly bumped into him.

"Angeal? How do you feel?" he questioned a little bit worried.

"Ah, it's nothing serious. I'm just… a little bit tired." Angeal answered with a much more tired voice than he claimed he was.

"You sure we shouldn't take a rest?"

It would be best for Angeal if they took a rest to regain strength. "No. We better find the others ones first." Angeal stated with confidence.

Cloud was worried he would say that. He too wanted to find the others, but they needed energy if they wanted to survive the search and possible encounters.

He decided to try something else "Are you sure we can't take a rest? I'm pretty tired myself." he said hoping Angeal would agree to find a safe place to rest on.

"Alright." was the short reply after a short moment of thinking.

Find a safe place and have some rest was the first thing on the list for now. As for the trio, one of them couldn't continue any further soon. Genesis legs had been hurting something terribly since they had that great run through the corridors. Many times he had thought about stopping to take a short rest but his inner voices would call him weak and he didn't want to give in to them. But now he actually started to fall behind the other two.

"Guys, I can't take it anymore." he said in a slightly painful voice and went over to the wall and slid down it to the ground.

The others turned around worried "Hey, you can't give up now." Zack said fearing he meant giving up to continue forward at all.

"What's wrong?" Sephiroth asked and kneeled down in front of his friend. Though, he knew that there were many things wrong with all of them at the moment.

"My legs are killing me. It's been hurting worse and worse ever since we ran from all the monsters." Genesis said and massaged a part of his leg that hurt especially much.

Sephiroth noted it was the same place the three headed beast had bitten him.

"Did you ever check for wounds at all after that monster had let you go?"

"Only my feet and my hurt arm." Genesis said with a low voice and started unbuckle the belts on his boots to take them off and have a better check on his legs.

Just because the holes in his boots were small didn't mean the teeth biting him wouldn't reach all the way through both his leather boots and pants.

As he now took a proper look he found out his legs were actually bleeding from many small, deep wounds, like the monster had been chewing on his legs while he was still unconscious. The wounds had probably not been so serious at first but more of worsen after all the running.

"That looks pretty serious." Zack said worryingly, he had a little hard to concentrate at the moment too as the demonic laughter seemed amused by the situation.

Sephiroth seemed to ponder on the options left by the situation and what could possibly happen if they encountered a monster.

"We should look for an aid kit to take care of that." Sephiroth said and rose "There must be one close, if not other survivors has already taken everything."

"And what about me?" Genesis questions a little worried.

His question was met by silence. Running from another monster encounter would just make things worse for him and he was limping rather slowly right now.

"We should split." It pained Sephiroth to admit it.

"…Fine. I'll hide somewhere and wait for you to come back." Genesis said with a sigh. He didn't want to be left alone, but his inner voices would torment him if he shows sign of weakness by asking for protection.

"I have fire on my side; I can always burn those monsters to crisps if they get too close." he said in an attempted humor like way.

"We need to take you to a safe room first." Sephiroth said and helped his friend up when his boots were back on.

"Then we promise to be back as soon as we can." Zack said in an as much hopeful voice he could at the moment.


	19. Chapter 19

The group of two continued forwards on and on. Their minds as alert as they could possibly be in their sleep deprived state. Cloud was having a harder and harder time to keep up. To put one foot before the other began to take all his energy. Angeal lead the way more like sleepwalking than actually walking. Soon it wouldn´t matter it they found a safe place or not. They were both so tired, they wouldn´t be able to fight something off. They could possibly run from something but never fight. Their minds went more and more dull.

"AngealIhavetosleep." Cloud muttered and stopped his staggering walk, now half conscious leaning against a wall.

"You are right." Angeal answered and yawned. "We both have to sleep." He laid his arm on Clouds shoulder and they settled for that to not lose each other in the darkness that was more caused by their eyes inability to stay open than actual darkness.

Well, Cloud couldn´t see a thing at the moment, the corridor was pitch black so the loss of his eyes didn´t really make a that big difference.

Suddenly Angeal felt his foot stepping on something softer than the rubble that's been littering the path. Whatever he stepped on made an angry hissing and jabbed it's teeth into Angeal's leg, causing the larger man to gasp in pain and step back, the creature fleeing the scene quickly. They continued slightly angry, but the tiredness returned to them.

Finally they reached a door in the long corridor that wasn´t broken. They opened it and walked in, now more awake by the hope of getting somewhere safer to sleep. It had originally been two rooms connected by a door in a wall. The wall was more or less torn down but whoever that had done it hadn´t lingered there longer; there was nothing there to eat. They looked into the other room that looked more like a storage or something. It had no other doors that the one that was blocked by all the debris.

Together they blocked the outer door to the corridor with a table that they together managed to draw in place. Whoever that had had their office there had a thing for oak. To their little blockade they added a few chairs and with much effort they dragged out some of the things from the storage room and used them to block the door. A few heavy boxes of left over offices supplies had to do. Then they made their way back though a hole in the wall. Sealed the three big holes that they found by stacking heavy boxes in front of them.

They found few packages of long experienced biscuits when they were looking for more stuff to secure their safe place and happily shared one. It wasn´t fresh, but it was something to eat. None of them had had anything to eat since lunch, and that lunch wasn´t really a good one either. Exhausted from lack of sleep and the effort of making their sanctuary safe they both thought sleep.

"I´ll take first watch." Angeal said and shook his head to concentrate.

Cloud slept within a minute.

Angeal sunk down in memories, trying not to fall asleep. They changed two times. When Angeal was woken up by Cloud again they both felt as if they had got no sleep at all.

"It´s no use." Cloud muttered.

"I can guard the rest of the night, I have had enough sleep." Angeal lied.

"No, I should guard the rest, I got to sleep a bit before." Cloud argued in a hushed voice. His body already drifting into sleep.

They kept arguing, within short Cloud fell asleep again whether he wanted to or not. Even Angeal fell asleep despite trying to stay awake. And so the pair was sleeping quietly in the isolated room.

The little trio dragged itself along. Genesis didn´t really keep up, he couldn´t run, that was for sure but he made the best out of the situation. Limping along with the others he tried to focus on the pain. The voices in his head had returned to dishonoring the goddess. He couldn´t handle much more now.

The other two's inner demons weren't quiet either. Zack was surrounded by laughter, mocking him in every way they could. He hated it; he focused on finding a safe place. It was not easy, all doors had been demolished.

Sephiroth's begging voices where drawing away a lot of his attention. They were begging for help. Now he had a hard time to really see the corridor. His mind was dragging him away to much darker places. Places filled with blood and screams. Places without light. Places where the only hope that there was to cling to was that master might get so angry that he accidently killed you. He was very near a breakdown of some sort and no longer noticed the piece of glass in his hand that was cutting up a deep wound in his hand, leaving a small trail of fresh blood behind.

They continued on very slowly tiptoeing trough the corridors. They couldn´t fight of anything without real weapons and they couldn´t run. After an excursing long time they finally found a whole door. It was an unlocked cleaning closet with a few spare broken things in it.

"Perfect." Zack said, trying to be positive. The other ones actually saw something positive in the situation.

"I'll block the door and just you knock and I open it." Genesis said as he scanned the closet for anything dangerous.

"We will be back as soon as we can." Sephiroth insured as Genesis closed the door.

"I´ll just hide here and lie low for some time." Genesis said and made it up on the shelf, fire materia close by.

A roar in the distance shook Cloud and Angeal awake.

"Good, now I believe we should continue." Cloud said as they both where shaken awake by the roaring of the beast.

"And in the opposite direction." Angeal said and yawned, Cloud agreed silently.

Angeal got to his feet, still sleepily but no longer by the brink of exhaustion. Cloud also got up by grabbing a steady shelf on the wall. Then he took a step forwards and fell down. His right leg didn´t hold his weight.

"Weird." he said as Angeal helped him up on his feet again.

Once more Cloud fell down when he tried to put weight on his right leg. This time Angeal catched him. He sat him down on the remains of a broken table.

"Does it hurt?"

Cloud shook his head. He took of his right boot and rolled up the leg of his dirty, thorn originally dark pants. The thing had bit him. And it didn´t hurt enough he realized. His leg had a nice row of rather deep bites but for some reason it didn´t hurt. Poison they both thought.

"Can you move your toes?" Angeal asked and tried to not sound worried only a small wrinkle on his forehead betrayed him.

Thankfully, Cloud who couldn´t make out much in the darkness, didn´t notice. Cloud moved his toes a little and nodded. It just seemed like he had lost all feelings of pain in his leg. Angeal gave up a small sigh and went looking for something to stabilize the leg with.

"It will be all right." he said as he walked into the room next to the one they had taken shelter in by pushing aside some of the debris and pressing himself through a hole in the wall. He tore down the curtains of the windows with as few sounds as possible. He went back to Cloud who tried to stand up on his good leg while trying how his right one behaved.

"I can move it, but I sure can't run a mile." he said. "I just have to think of that the muscles don't really behave like I want to." He sat down on the broken table again and Angeal quickly stabilized his leg a bit with the help of the curtains and a piece of wood that he had found.

They continued in silence.

Sephiroth and Zack went more and more tired. There was no sign of any first aid boxes and soon they would have to lie down and sleep. It was getting hard to make out things before their feet and their minds didn´t help.

"We have to sleep." Zack stated as Sephiroth caught him as he nearly fell.

"We do." Sephiroth agreed.

They both realize that they couldn´t help their friend when they were so tired that they didn´t see their own feet. They made their way into a room that looked whole enough and after blocking the door with an old table they sunk down in a corner. Zack had closed his eyes already.

Sephiroth looked around in the room. A silver haired dirty child sat in a corner; it was very thin and sat on its knees, bent over something. It lifted its head; the face of the child was smeared with blood and looked him in the eye. It was chewing on something, blood running down over its pale in sunken skin. He knew it was human flesh without looking, he felt it, tasted it. He shivered slightly. Sephiroth felt sorry for the poor thing, the boy must be really hungry. He looked at the spot again but the child where gone without a trace.

"If I get any madder than this, please kill me." he muttered and sat down on a cardboard box.

"And how exactly would I do that?" Zack asked sleepily and turned over to his side and fell asleep within two seconds.

Soon, so soon also Sephiroth was lured into sleep.

Genesis thought he wasn´t tired, yet he fell asleep not very many minutes after the others had left. He stirred slightly in his sleep at a distant rumble but he didn´t really notice. He woke up much later and that with a scream. Something bit him in his arm. He grabbed first lose object and killed the thing. It was small as a rat so he wasn´t exactly deeply injured.

The creature had four legs, big round eyes and very sharp teeth. It looked somewhat like a rat with fangs. He grumbled slightly. He was alert again. A noise reached his ears. It was the sound of claws against the floor in the outside corridor. The moment the creature out there decided to make its way into the room he was screwed. He made a quick note on the wall.

"If you don't find me dead I am still alive. I'm not getting eaten"

He didn´t really care if someone would help him or not, the note was for his friends who otherwise would lose hope completely if they didn´t find him if they would return. The walls of the small room started to sway. The thing had demolished the room next to the cleaning closet in which he hid. It sounded like it had found something too. He silently sneaked out of the closet and fled the field as fast as he could.

Resting had done wonders to his body. He was sneaking along the corridor as fast as his legs let him as something happened. He felt something take a grip around his waist, he tried to kick it of but then he felt, all suddenly, a thick chain of steel being circled around his neck. He panicked. He kicked punched bite and hit the thing that tried to kill him but it was of no use. The chain closed in more and more, digging its way into his flesh bit by bit. He fell down on his knees, gasping for air, desperately trying to pry away the chain from his neck. His vision was fading more and more until he fell down on his back unable to defend himself.

He woke up on the floor, fire materia still laying close by. The chains had dug their way into his flesh but they no longer stopped him from breathing. He raised his hands to his neck and detangled himself from the chains. He took a deep breath, his lungs had been aching for that relieving breath. That air so fowl with the overwhelming stench of dirt, blood and burning human flesh could be like sweet nectar. He picked up his materia and pocketed it. He couldn´t fight right now anyway. He got up on his knees and turned around. Something had saved his life. He took a look at the creature on the floor and was suddenly happy that he hadn´t eaten anything. It was dead now but not less disgusting.

Its skin was cold and had the texture of half rotten leaves. The thing had two eyes still whole in their sockets. A third was missing completely a forth was dangling out in a disgusting way and a fifth looked like someone had burred their claws through it. The creature had no claws but long slender fingers with skin in between them. There was also skin between the things extraordinarily long toes. For weapon it used the chains and it also had very big fangs sticking out of its mouth, its lips where drawn back so the line of teeth was clear to see. There were only eight of them though. Four one and a half decimeter long and five centimeters broad fangs on the corners of its mouth and in the middle two pairs of smaller but still sharp teeth.

It was very clear how it had been killed since it´s throat had been cut drenching the whole place in its dark green blood and someone had pulled out it´s lungs from its ribcage.

Genesis turned away disgusted. He was indeed grateful over the opportunity to live a few moments longer but he was exhausted from the fight that had nearly taken his life.

Cloud and Angeal went on. Angeal slowly starting to notice that his left leg was becoming more and more numb. Suddenly the world went black in a loud "rawr". Things happened fast.

When Cloud woke up he wished he hadn´t. All of his body hurt like hell. He opened his eyes and where surprised by finding himself in a kind of twilight. He couldn't tell where he was or what that had happened. He tried to move only to discover that he was covered in different sized parts of debris. He couldn´t move. He was stuck. Under his breath he cursed whatever demons that may have caused this. He moved his head a bit back and forth. His sight didn't improve. He could only see weak spots of light in the openings of the debris that covered him. He took a deep breath to prepare to try to get loose. The clear smell of blood filled his nostrils. He froze in fear.

"Angeal!" he yelled at the top of his voice. "Angeal!"

Then it struck him Angeal hadn't been next to him, he had been in front of him. Pushing Cloud out of harm's way.

A loud noise from a small distance away made him freeze. The sound of long claws over steel made him shiver in fright. The thing stopped. Then he heard more and a loud thump as the creature landed near him in the debris.

Cloud lay absolutely still, the voices in his head were desperate by now and he found himself praying for his life. The creature draws a deep breath and tried to find a scent in the air. Then it began to dig in the debris. After a while it stopped. Then suddenly a big claw went down through the debris as it sat down its foot. The claw missed Clouds face with centimeters and was as long as his arm.

The thing put some weight on the foot and Cloud could hear a few of his ribs breaking. He didn't feel it though, he was too afraid for that. Then the creature changed its mind. It turned around, picked up something and left. Cloud lay still for several minutes before he was sure of that he really was alive. It was completely silent, but he was alive. He tried to move and found out that he now could move his arms more freely through the debris. He raised his hands and tried to push away the pieces of concrete that lay above his head.

He somehow managed to push them to the side. Then slide down a meter or so and he drew a new breath. His ribs pained him. But that would have to wait. Right now he had to get up. And find Angeal. He looked around himself, then he looked upwards. Something had made the floor collapse. He saw that the roof of the corridor in which they had been in had broken in, then something had smashed its way through the floor and the next one. He desperately prayed that Angeal had made his way away, or never fell down and just left him for dead.

He desperately tried to ignore the voice in his head that said that Angeal never would abandon a friend without sure knowledge of what that had happened to them. There was debris everywhere and the huge hole blocked any passage to any of the two other floors that he had fallen through.

He pushed pieces of debris aside and began to crawl upwards.


	20. Chapter 20

Angeal slowly woke up with a numb body and a painful ringing in his ears. He was laying on his stomach and his face to the side. The last thing he remembered was a loud crack, then the sound of something very sturdy breaking, he pushed away Cloud and then something fell over him. Cloud. What happened to the boy?

The feeling in his body started coming back and he moved slightly to test his limbs. It was painful and he could feel fresh wounds on his back. There were something sticky on his face too and he had a taste of blood in his mouth. Great, his head was bleeding rather serious. His left leg was still partly numb, but he could move it.

As the ringing in his ears started to fade, it was replaced by many different growling sounds. They were close to him, very close, too close. He found himself doing something Genesis would most likely do; he started to pray to the Goddess. As his vision started to clear in the dark he could make out a clawed paw in front of his face, the claws larger than his head. A long tail swayed behind the leg and would often make a twitch, making the tail look like a whip.

In the darkness only a few meters away, many eyes were shining in a circle around him, all belonging to a different sized monster. It was obvious he was in the middle of a food fight, where he was the meal everyone wanted. He slowly turned around to see what monster tried to defend its found meal. The dark low growling from the beast above him sounded uneasily familiar and he froze when he noticed the body shape, mane on the back and the only head he saw was like a behemoth's with long thin horns.

All around there were monsters packed together. Angeal wondered why they didn't attack; there were at least 20 against one. He looked around some more and could make out a hole in the roof behind some of the monsters, probably the place where he had been before the crash. He feared what could have happened to Cloud, who at the moment had just reached the top of the debris that had a short while ago covered him.

A little while ago he had heard a loud roar from above but he hadn't heard it again. His chest hurt something terribly from the broken ribs. The light he had seen under the debris had been an exit sign, they didn't go on the electricity like everything else, they were going on batteries.

There weren't anything close to him that lived, which made him happy, but he could hear the faint growling of monsters on the floor above him. He wanted to scream for Angeal again, but feared to do so as the monster maybe could hear him, but what if Angeal was with the monster. His inner voices were crying loudly, almost making himself sob slightly. This was no good, no good at all. He had to find a way to the others, or he could burry himself in the debris again and hope the others would come pass him.

But then the monsters could get him. He was getting so confused, what should he do? Is Angeal in danger right above him? Should he chance? Suddenly he heard a scream of pain that sounded like Angeal's.

"Oh, no…" he whispered in fear.

Angeal must be in real danger.

One of the monsters closest to Angeal in the circle slightly behind the beast dared to quietly move forward. Angeal still lay on the ground but had turned so the horrible claws weren't 5 centimeters from his face. He saw the small four legged being close up from behind the monster slowly towards him, he didn't dare to move. He looked around himself for the metal piece he used for weapon before, but it was gone, just his luck.

The monster closing up to him had large ears, a large mouth and one large eye, but it had two irises and pupils that shined red, one which watched him and the other watched the monster. Even when the monster leaned down its head towards him he didn't dare move an inch, he just stared wide eyed at the monster.

Just as the monster opened its mouth to bite him, the behemoth monster turned like a reptile and with just one swing of its paw slashed up the other beings face to shreds. Its right head made a loud roar and bent down its middle and left head towards Angeal, making sure the other being didn't touch its food.

Angeal was both terrified and grateful at the same time, the monster above him would make sure he wasn't taken by any of the other monsters, but he never know if this monster would decide to eat its meal in the middle of the circle or if the other monsters would decide to attack.

This behemoth monster seemed to be feared by the rest anyways and hopefully it preferred eating in peace alone somewhere. Angeal heard the tail of the being make a swishing sound as it probably whipped another monster.

A third monster, this one larger than the one above him, with something that looked like a knife in its hand, walked on two legs and had two arms bent down to the ground and reached for one of Angeal's arms which he had in front of him to keep his head up. The behemoth decided what was too close, then took a few steps forward and actually slashed of the other monsters arm with one swing. The third monster retreated with a whimper.

Then Angeal felt something bite down in his right leg and started drag him out from underneath the monster. He made a surprised and painful scream and actually grabbed onto the behemoth monster's hind leg on reflex since the fourth monster was acting quick and Angeal acted before thinking for once.

The behemoth whipped the monster with its tail before turning around biting the fourth monster by its neck since it didn't let go of its meal. The sound of bone cracking and flesh ripping made Angeal nauseated, the behemoth monster must be really pissed off if it acts like this now, but not before. He had let go of the leg of the monster when it turned around and as he felt the pressure on his leg loosen he turned onto his side and bent his leg with the still stuck head to pry it off of him.

Right now he was absolutely grossed out, terrified, worried and feared for his life more than ever. As he got off the head the behemoth put one of its clawed paws over him and slid him back to the middle of the circle, cutting up three long wounds along Angeal's side as it did so, and then continued chasing of the other monsters that dared getting any closer.

More and more of them were trying their luck, some retreating into the circle, some being slain by the behemoth monster and some only losing a limb or receiving a severe wound. Angeal was starting to panic and he realized he started to use the obviously deadly monster above him as a shield, even if he knew it could decide to kill him any second.

"I'm going to die…" he whispered in repeat over and over every time he crawled away from another monster.

Zack and Sephiroth were rudely awoken by a loud crash echoing outside the room in the halls.

"What was that?" Zack said, now with more rest he was more alert than he was before.

Sephiroth rose and opened the door slowly. Outside he could see the silhouettes of monsters moving towards the sounds source.

"I don't know what it was, but the monsters seem attracted by it." Sephiroth said in a whisper

"Let's hope no one is in danger though." Zack commented in a faded whisper as the laughters got louder in his head.

"Wait…" Sephiroth suddenly said "Can you hear it?"

Zack rose and listened but he didn't hear anything out of the ordinary

"No. I can't hear-"

"Listen carefully." Sephiroth cut him off and Zack sighed.

He listened more carefully but still didn't hear anything.

"It stopped…" his friend then said.

"I never heard anything. Seph, you know I've got a freak laughing at me and that you have better hearing than any of us." Zack said a little disturbed as his laughing demons continued "What did you really hear anyway?"

"Someone was screaming far away, most likely from the source of the crash."

"You sure it wasn't your voices in the head?"

Sephiroth turned towards him and seemed a bit hurt by the statement that Zack didn't seem to believe him. He missed the goofy puppy that would cheer everyone up.

"I'm pretty sure that was another person I heard, someone might be in danger. And what if it's any more survivors, what if it's Angeal or Cloud, or even Genesis?" Sephiroth said in a tone that got more and more serious until the end.

Zack seemed surprised by his sudden seriousness, but now he knew that Sephiroth was probably speaking the truth.

"Okay, let's go. But I doubt it's Genesis, we left him in a safe room and the crash seemed to come from the opposite way we came from."

He just tried to be a little optimistic.

They went to pick up their weapons and Sephiroth noticed something somewhat disturbing; his whole left hand was covered with blood. He noticed the scars in his palm and on his fingers and realized he must have cut up his hand with the glass piece without notice. He needed to be careful.

Then they were off to the source of the crash. After walking for some time trying to figure out the correct way they suddenly heard an uncomfortable familiar roar and headed that way.

"I have a bad feeling about this." Zack muttered uncomfortably "Don't you feel like you have heard that roar before?" he asked Sephiroth with some fear in his voice.

"Actually, yes." Sephiroth said in a low and also slightly fearful voice.

"Maybe we should leave it be." Zack said and Sephiroth nodded.

But just as they stopped to turn around and head back they heard a somewhat familiar scream of a person they were pretty sure they knew. They looked at each other with wide and fearful eyes before they dashed down the hall towards the source, their inner voices being fueled by their worry.

On Genesis part, he limped alongside the wall. A quiet sound in the distance had made him stop but he didn't think much about it. He took short breaks now and then to rest his pain throbbing legs. Every once in a while he would hear a low squeak, probably made by a rat and as he took another break he noticed a few of those rat like things like the one he killed before.

About three of them sat at a distance from him and watched as he stared at them in a threatening way. His voices were pretty low at the moment since his focus was more alert on the surroundings now, which he was thankful for. He rose and continued forward, doing quick checks of all the rooms he found, hoping to find another one with a whole door. Why was it so difficult?

As he once again sat down to have a short rest he turned to look at the rats again, five of them now. Were they stalking him?

He picked up a piece of debris from the demolished door next to him and throws it at the little group of rats, hitting one of them and he smirks in triumph. The rats made a growling sound at him and disappeared in the dark. He just shrugged and continued.

Next time when he stopped and turned around there were nothing behind him, but he still heard the squeak they made in the dark. He sat down and hoped they wouldn't bother him. Why did they stalk him anyway? Did they smell the blood and wanted to have a taste?

As he looked into the dark wondering, he suddenly noticed the small rats' silhouettes all around him, more than ever. This didn't please him. He readied his materia, prepared to chase the small pests away, or kill them.

Just as he sent away a small fireball that burned a few of the ones in half the circle the rest jumped at him and started biting at the first thing they caught.

"Damn you tiny pathetic things!" he growled as he rose and started to brush, drag and shake them off of him. Killing them any way he could. His voices were clearer now and made fun of his situation. He was very frustrated when the last rats were killed and he hoped the others could find him soon. Little did he know that he and the rest were coming further and further away from each other.


	21. Chapter 21

**21.** Cloud dragged himself a bit to the side, not exactly willing to once again fall all the way down, and then he collapsed. He suddenly heard a scream that shook him awake properly, he had a hard time to only breathe with his broken ribs and the pure shock of being still alive wasn't exactly making him more focused.

He tried to make his head stop spinning as something hit him hard in the side and in the back shortly after another. His lungs were not really coping with the unkind treatment, not to speak of the rest of his body, and he merely made a wheezing, hissing sound and tried desperately to catch his breath before the thing attacked him again. He saw nothing but drew his knife never the less.

Genesis was staggering along the endless corridors. There where yet again eyes at his heels. He didn´t notice until suddenly one of the big rat monsters sat before his feet. He kicked it out of his way. He shouldn´t have. As if they were one being, rats lounged themselves at him. Their giant eyes burning bright in the darkness.

He shivered and burned a bunch of them to ashes. It didn´t really help though. They were together and as if they would have been one big being made up from thousands of pieces they moved together and caused complete chaos. He burned them until one rat snatched away his fire material from his hand. He went slightly mad at the offence and ignored his injured body as he simply stomped down the rat with his foot and picked up and pocketed the materia. He decided to try to get away from the hairy little beasts.

When he had decided it he started to run, hoping that the spurt of energy would make them lose him. It didn´t work, his legs where far too injured to be able to keep the pace that he wanted to achieve. Perhaps it would have worked if it was one monster, or twenty. Right now were the rat monsters closer to a thousand and twenty than twenty.

They were biting and clawing every part of his body that they could get hold of. Their claws where not long and neither was their teeth, but they where so many. Soon they crawled all over him covering his eyes from sight.

Stupidly enough he continued to stagger along and when he heard a low growling behind him he panicked and began to run. He shouldn´t have. Suddenly the ground disappeared beneath his feet.

Sephiroth and Zack were running towards the sound of their friend screaming, they were unsure about what to do but they couldn´t do nothing. They were only hoping that Cloud in some miraculous way was unharmed. They doubted it. They were making their way though rumble and didn´t stop for anything.

Suddenly Zack stumbled and fell over something but didn´t stop to check what it was. When it hissed at him but didn´t attack he continued and thought that he had to handle it later.

Genesis fell. Far. The rats tumbled around him even when falling to their death they attacked him repeatedly. Suddenly his falling stopped. Just like that. It hurt. Or well. It didn´t stop just like that. He had desperately reached for something to stop his fall, not that it had helped him.

He was entangled in something and didn´t know what. There wasn´t that many rats anymore. His left arm was pierced by a long broken off piece of metal. There seemed to be metal cables all around him. His head hurt like hell. When he once again could see now with fewer rats and less blood dripping in his eyes he froze with fear. He was in a hole. He wasn´t at the bottom of it. Not even near the bottom. He didn´t dare to look down. Much later he heard a distant thump as the amount of rats landed.

It didn´t make him feel better. His voices were very bad, but he somehow felt distant from his body. It was as if the pain and suffering no longer really affected his mind. Shock he realized. He had no chance to find his friends again. Absolutely none.

Neither did he care if someone from the company would find him later. He would most likely not be alive then. The metal cables were keeping his weight up, the question was, for how long?

He was exhausted, not having enough energy to reach up to remove the cables twisted around his neck. He wouldn´t have dared anyway. The rats had thorn some cables apart with their teeth. The voices in his head were being awful again. Calling the goddess names he would never even think.

"I am your soldier; I can fight and die for your honor, but goddess save us!" His prayer was but a whisper in the night.

He continues to pray for all that he was worth.

Angeal was not exactly having the time of his life. He was being trashed here and there. None of the others was getting big hits but everything added up was getting to him bit by bit. He was swinged into a pile of debris and grabbed the first piece he could find, a broken steel table leg. Suddenly he got hit in his head. His vision was fading more and more. Blood streamed over his face from the wound in his head.

Zack and Sephiroth reached the hole. First they saw nothing, then they saw eyes. A bit too many eyes. They ran as if in some kind of a weird macabre dance. The thing that they all focused on was neatly protected by the huge monster from before. Sephiroth felt hatred burn in his eyes as he saw the thing down there.

When they both saw that the object of attention was Angeal they both went absolutely mad. Raging down the steep slope of debris with improvised weapons raised high they managed to shock the crowd of monsters enough to let them reach Angeal. None of them was aware of all the injuries that they got from it. Their minds were blank fighting together in rage.

They dragged Angeal away a bit. He really didn´t look good. He couldn´t stand, had lost a bit of blood and was in general chocked by everything. He had had better days to put it shortly.

"How are you" Sephiroth asked worried.

"I´m fine, Cloud I'm not sure though" he said with pain in his voice. "Someone buried under all that couldn´t have high chance to survive."

He grieved his friend.

At the moment he didn´t notice Genesis' absence, he was too focused on trying to survive and not giving in to his injuries.

"We have no chance fighting these" Zack stated and reached for Angeal.

They started to climb upwards. They almost fainted when they looked up only to be met by an army of eyes. The pack from before had caught up. Their hearts froze in their chests.

Suddenly something happened. From above there came pieces of debris flying. Hitting monsters who tried to get them. The trio made their way upwards and the army of eyes lost their concentration when they were hit by stones. Some of them fell. The pack, loyal to its members attacked the group of monsters when they tried to eat the single dark, furry thing with long teeth that had fallen down in their midst.

The little trio made their way up easily. On the edge of the hole were they attacked by two of the monsters. They were big as the largest dog and had monstrous red eyes and their many broad, long fangs shone in the darkness. They were killed fast by a hit from Zack followed by a kick from Sephiroth that sent one over the edge. The other one sank down. A knife had cut up its throat.

A familiar figure pulled out the knife and dried it off on the remains of his pants.

"Good to see you Angeal, thought you were dead"

"Same on you" said Angeal shocked. "But it´s not too late to fulfill that fear I'm afraid"

"Yes let's move with haste before they realize that the meal they argued over is gone" agreed Sephiroth.

"By the way, thanks Seph for the cloak and dagger lessons that you taught me. I would never have been able to do that otherwise."

"I believe it didn´t notice you until it was dead and very good to see you alive".

They softly tiptoed away as fast and swift as they could (not that swift for that matter).

Zack had now his back and chest filled with deep bleeding claw wounds. Sephiroth had the same problem and had also bites on his arms and legs. He didn´t have the opportunity from a longer weapon but hadn´t noticed the injuries before. Neither did he now notice a long fang that was still sitting in his right shoulder. His right foot had been pierced by something's long claws. Apart from that had Zack a bite in his left shoulder and the general state of the four was less good. Every part of their clothes was covered in blood and they where silently winching an every step.


	22. Chapter 22

They made their way down the dark hallway in silence, trying to keep their whimpers of pain to themselves. They all were desperate for some kind of cure or heal Angeal noted as he observed everyone. But as he did so, he noticed that they missed one member.

"Where is Genesis?" Angeal asked a bit worried, he hoped the others would know the answer.

"He was with us" Sephiroth answered "But he could barely walk, he barricaded himself in a closet so Zack and I could search for an aid kit for him, but right now I believe we all need one."

"But he's safe at least I guess." Angeal turned his head towards the ground, he had a bad feeling he couldn't explain, but he still hoped for the best.

"Maybe we should go and get him now, even if we haven't found anything." Zack said and winched, he didn't know why, but the way the laughter in his head sounded more sinister gave him bad feelings.

They all had a chilling feeling they didn't like, but no one mentioned it.

Genesis' mind had temporarily left his body but was snatched back to reality when he heard a worrying sound made by the cables holding him up. One of them snatched and he felt there weren't much that held him up, the rest would most likely break rather soon.

His body moved down slightly, tightening the wire around his neck and making him realize the metal piece through his arm was stuck to something. If the other cables would break he would only hang by the one around his neck or hang with his arm stuck on the metal piece. Both would be rather painful. He had two wires left before he could decide which one he thought of best. His mind wandered again.

"Oh no…" was everyone thinking when they reached what was supposed to be the closet in which Genesis was hiding in, but Zack was the one to utter the words.

The door was wrecked and the inside a mess. Every one of them stood and stared at the scene with grief, once again they didn't know if their friend have been killed or not.

"There is no blood." Zack noted trying to give some hope of their friend still being alive.

"There is something on the wall there." Angeal noticed and moved closer to it, Sephiroth brought out his flashlight to make a closer inspection of the room.

"If you don't find me dead I am still alive. I'm not getting eaten" Cloud read on the wall, the words gave them some hope.

Genesis could still be alive.

"We should hurry up and try find him then!" Angeal said and went out into the hall again and looking at the two paths they had to choose from.

"He would most likely go this way, since that was the way we came from before." Sephiroth noted and pointed the flashlight the way they should go.

They hurried down the hall as fast as their injuries let them go.

As the second wire snatched things got really unsteady for Genesis. For the first time since he fell down into that dark place he moved to keep his balance. Only one wire left that meant life or death for him right now. With his only usable arm he held onto the more unimportant cables.

The cable around his neck was tight enough to make it hard to breath and the metal piece in his arm was now cutting his wound larger slowly. The whole situation was like a torture.

"Maybe it's less painful to just drop to the ground?" he muttered and started to fiddle with the wire around his neck.

His mind was still not really there, making it easy to ignore the insulting voices, though, some comments did still reach trough to him and would make him twitch or lose concentration for a short moment.

He got loose the wire around his neck after some times work and just as he reached for the metal piece, the last wire holding him up snatched. The sudden pain in his arm took his whole being back to reality and he made a long whimper as he tried to hold up his body weight with his better arm. He noticed the metal piece had swayed from the sudden weight it was exposed to, so maybe he could make it break off.

Heaving himself up and then letting his weight fall back down seemed to work well. He didn't really think about what would happen if he got it off, he didn't know how far down it was. When he got it off and started falling to the ground he would find out eventually.

"See, here's more!" Both Cloud and Zack said as they found more remains of obviously burned rats.

They had went down the chosen path and first found nothing, then a few burned corpses of rats that they assumed had been made by Genesis and his fire materia. As they had continued they had found only more and more, but now they had vanished.

"Could we have missed something?" Angeal wondered more to himself but Sephiroth listened to him.

"I guess it is possible that he maybe would take a turn, but I don't see why he would do it." he said.

They all suddenly stopped as the flashlight shone at a large hole in the floor with no possibility to pass around.

"Well, if he would need a reason to turn down another path it would be this." Sephiroth said

"I guess head back then and make a turn for the best?" Cloud said.

Genesis whimpered in pain once again, he was rather disappointed that the fall hadn't been so far. He sat up slowly and pulled out the metal piece nothing gentle at all, what had he done to deserve this much suffering? Why couldn't he just have a quick painless death? A monster could most likely kill him with one hit. He rose to his feet but almost fell back down again because of all the pain.

"Why do you let me endure all this?" he said with a shaky voice, he didn't know to whom he spoke to though. "Why can't I be given a less painful end?" His voice changed from shaky to almost a bit angry. "You know I suffer, so you just wait till I give in completely, right!? You know you can give me a quick death, that's why you stay away and hide in the darkness now! I know you're here around! Just come and get me!"

At the end he screamed into the darkness and his body was shaking with rage. Was he trying to talk to the monsters?

He fell back down to the ground on his knees as the voices in his head promised never-ending torment and eternal pain. His body was still shaking, but now not because of rage, but of fear, sadness and worry.

Where Angeal, Sephiroth, Zack and Cloud walked they could hear an echoing yelling from behind them. They had just reached the first T-crossing in which they were going to take a turn.

All of them looked at each other after the echo faded.

"Do you think.., he could have actually fallen down.., that hole?" Angeal said in a worried voice.

Genesis was already badly hurt, and who knew how far down that hole goes. If this was the chase that he had fallen down there, he could most likely suffer even more damage.

"Let's hurry." Sephiroth said and they headed for the hole again to climb down it.

Genesis had noticed a faint green light in a room in front of him. He knew the ghosts favored blue or yellow light and would most of the time be combined by some kind of sound. Everything was quiet.

He tried to move his left arm, the fingers was okay, the hand hurt slightly if he bent it too much, his elbow was as good as stuck bent and his shoulder he could move, but it hurt when he did. So he kept his hurt arm close to his body and crawled into the room.

He found it to be a patient's room, but it was wrecked with the bed lying on its side. The light came from a small leaking container of mako, which he found very weird. He thought only the labs worked with mako. In the middle of the room was a familiar looking book lying, he crawled over to it and found out that the previous patient of this room probably had liking to LOVELESS. The book was thorn and many pages missing, but it didn't matter, he knew everything by heart anyways.

He sat down in the middle of the room, hugged the book close to his chest, pressed his legs to his body and leaned down his head on his knees, just like he was trying to protect the book with his body.

"When the war of the beasts brings about the worlds end, the Goddess descends from the sky, wings of light and dark spread afar, she guides us to bliss, her gift everlasting." he whispered, his body shaking and his voice too.

"One thing I desire the most, is your gift…" his voice was slightly cracking up as he whispered his words "But I know, when I receive your gift, everything else will be lost."

The voices in his mind was continuing to promise him painful things, criticize him, tell horrible things about the goddess and telling him that it all are lies he believes in.

"Are you testing me? Or are you punishing me? Do I deserve the bliss of oblivion to you?"

Oh the sweet, painless bliss of oblivion that would be death, the Lifestream, where there would only be peace.

Even if it was something he wished for, to be by the goddess side, he is only in the early twenties, there were so much more of life's gifts to take part of. He even fought in the army, where death was daily. Just because he had a late goal to achieve acceptance into the Lifestream, by the goddess, it didn't mean he couldn't fear death as well.

"Not yet..., please… There is so much more I don't want to miss, that I want to keep longer, Angeal, Sephiroth, everyone…" By now he was shaking uncontrollably and tears were running down his hidden face.

"I don't want to die yet…"

"None of us want you dead either."

Genesis' head flew up at the sound of Angeal's voice; he expected to see nothing, that it had only been his imagination, but in front of him sat a kneeling Angeal, Sephiroth, Zack and Cloud.

After all this hell, he could almost not believe they had actually managed to find him again. He changed position to sit on his knees and leaned his head onto Angeals shoulder, still crying, but now with joy that all of them were back together. The others were happy to find their friend alive, maybe not in the best kind of shape, but alive.

Angeal did his best to comfort his childhood friend, they didn't know what exactly had happened to him, but they were pretty sure it must have been like hell to wander around alone like this.


	23. Chapter 23

All of them were suddenly tired beyond words. There was nothing left to say. They were so happy that they were all alive that they couldn´t express themselves in words. They looked around the room trying to see if there was anything of use at all in it.

"We should move somewhere safer." said Zack and looked upwards. None of them wanted to be ambushed so they all nodded, took a final check around the room that didn´t result in anything else than two bottles of water and of course their already found mako and everyone smiled as Genesis stuck the very thorn LOVELESS copy under his arm, careful to not injury any of the pages any more.

They made their way out in the corridor, their hearts much lighter by now and by the lightness of heart everything seemed to get better.

As they got out of the room they heard a scratching sound from somewhere above them. They were all very happy that they had decided to move on and stood unmoving in complete silence for a few minutes until it was completely quiet. Then they continued.

They supported each other as well as they could by talking in low voices, making their way through the corridor. They walked with care; not wanting to slip on a floor that they knew was covered with sticky blood. There were no bodies though they all noted with a slight surprised though.

Suddenly Sephiroth froze in his tracks. The other ones didn´t notice, Sephiroth had always had the lightest of footsteps so no one heard the difference between him walking and standing still. He was usually proud over his capability to move without a sound over an area, he seems to know where that a floorboard would creak and therefore he never stepped on creaking ones. He had learned to be quiet; it had been the only way to survive.

This time it didn´t do him any good though, but he didn´t think of anything like tactics at the moment. A small boy, no more than five years old stood before him. Somehow Sephiroth knew that the boy was five, not four, not six, five. He knew it and how he possessed that knowledge was a complete mystery to him. The small boy was silver haired and had very pale skin. His clothes where grey and ragged, his feet bare. Wrists and ankles had wounds on them but the boy had never managed to break them himself. He was thin and fragile looking like a starved wild animal.

The boy looked Sephiroth in the eyes; his face was pained, tears streaming from his eyes. Sephiroth's eyes easily found the source of the pain. The little ones left shoulder was heavily bandaged and there where stains of blood every here and there and it was clear to see for everyone that looked that the bandage was insufficient for the wound on the little ones shoulder as there was a red patch half visible trough the almost white bandages.

Sephiroth couldn´t move. His mind was twirling down in darkness, falling helplessly into the raging madness that the small figure brought with him.

"..and I don't know really about that, what do you say Seph" Angeal answered Clouds question.

However no answer came from Sephiroth.

"Sephiroth?" Angeal said and turned around.

Sephiroth looked at him, then back to the child, which was gone. Sephiroth shivered and looked around once more before following the others.

"I´ll bet anything on it, I am going mad" Sephiroth muttered and tried to shake of the feeling of the small boys face.

They kept walking until they decided it was time to update on their injuries as the atmosphere felt relatively safe. They began to take a look at their injuries. Genesis taking a look at the wound on his shoulder made Angeal jump high in the air.

"What is it Angeal" said Genesis, "something else that the bastards have broken?"

"No not that, what´s that?" Angeal said and pointed at a mark at Genesis' left shoulder.

Genesis looked at the mark.

"No idea, got it at one of the trips to the hospital wing, I suppose it is just some weird scar"

"I have seen something similar on some creatures we have met, on the same place too" Angeal answered.

Sephiroth took a look at the mark and reacted very weirdly. His pupils grew larger, his mind half fury half shock and sadness. He settled to smacking his fist in the wall and dropping to the ground.

"I never thought the hospital would do something like that" Sephiroth said with a growl in his throat.

"Why, what is it?" asked Cloud confused.

"It´s a subject's mark" Sephiroth said angrily.

He showed up his shoulder where another, similar but different mark was seen, through all these years it had remained the same.

"I never thought the hospital would ever claim that technology and it is so wrong with you! You aren't exactly raised there!" Angrily he buried his face in his hand and they were all left to handle the new information.


End file.
